


M 1 



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HOUSE No. 415. 



REPORTS 



ON THE SUBJECT OF A 



LICENSE LAW, 



BY A 



JOINT SPECIAL COMMITTEE 



f wjislato of llto&tjra&ette ; 



TOGETHER WITH A 



STENOGRAPHIC REPORT OF THE 



TESTIMONY 



TAKEN BEFORE SAEO COMMITTEE. 






/ BOSTON: 

WRIGHT & POTTER, STATE PRINTERS, 
No. 4 Spring Lane. 

18C7. 



HNKo^o 



CONTENTS 






Page. 

Eeport of Committee, 5—22 

Number of Male Petitioners and Remonstrants, by Counties, .... 23 
Bill to regulate the Sale of Spirituous and Intoxicating Liquors, (reported by 

the Committee,) 24—32 

Minority Report, 33—52 

Bill to amend Section Ninth of Chapter Eighty-Six of the General Statutes, 

(reported by the Minority,) 53 

Dissenting Report, by Mr. Fay, 54— G3 

Bill to authorize Druggists and Apothecaries to sell Spirituous Liquors, 

(reported by Mr. Fay,) • . . . G4 

Bill concerning the State Liquor Commissioner aad State Assayer, (reported 

by Mr. Fay,) . GG 

Dissenting Report, by Mr. Sherman, 68 

APPENDIX. 

Testimony for Petitioners, . . . 2—417 

" for Remonstrants, 418—868 

" in behalf of College of Pharmacy, 869—894 

List of Witnesses, 895—898 



€ommontomltf) of JtlQ00ad)tt0£ii0, 



House of Representatives, May 14, 1867. 

The Joint Special Committee, to whom were referred the various 
Petitions of 34,963 legal voters, praying for the enactment of 
a law for the regulation of the sale of spirituous and intoxi- 
cating liquors, and the Petition of the Massachusetts College 
of Pharmacy, asking for such alterations in the present law 
that druggists and apothecaries may be permitted to sell 
liquors for medicinal and certain other purposes; together 
with the various Remonstrances of 25,863 legal voters, the 
officers of many temperance organizations and conventions, 
and of 14,471 women and others, severally against the pas- 
sage of a license law, submit the following 

REPORT: 

In view of the importance of the subject and the general 
interest manifested in it by the very large numbers of petitioners 
and remonstrants, the Committee determined to give a series of 
public hearings, at which testimony and arguments might be 
presented. These began on the 19th of February and ended on 
the 3d of April, there being twenty-seven in all. One hearing 
was given to the College of Pharmacy ; the remainder were 
equally divided between the petitioners and remonstrants. 
Under an Order of the legislature both parties were entitled to 
use the process of the Commonwealth in summoning any wit- 
nesses whom they desired from any part of the State, and their 
testimony is transmitted herewith as an Appendix to this Report. 
In addition to this large mass of evidence, able, learned and 
eloquent arguments were addressed to the Committee by the 



6 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

distinguished gentlemen who represented the several parties. 
The theory and workings of the present law and the expediency 
of any modification in the same were all investigated and dis- 
cussed with great thoroughness and care. Indeed it would 
hardly seem that any new light could be thrown upon the 
subject, upon either side. 

It is not necessary, nor would it be practicable, for the Com- 
mittee to review the testimony or arguments in detail. It will 
be sufficient that they state briefly the conclusions to which they 
have come. 

The prayer of the petitioners is for certain modifications of 
the statutes relating to the sale of spirituous and intoxicating 
liquors. 

These statutes have constituted a prominent feature in the 
criminal legislation of the State for many years. Enacted 
originally with the sincere belief on the part of many good men 
that they were right in principle and would prove successful in 
operation, they were designed, undoubtedly, like other criminal 
statutes, to promote the good order, peace and security of the 
community. They prohibit absolutely the sale of all spirituous 
and intoxicating liquors, including therein wine, ale, porter, 
lager beer and cider, to be used as a beverage, (recognizing, 
however, the right of importers to sell imported liquors in the 
original packages.) They prohibit, also, the sale of liquors for 
any other purpose, whether medicinal or mechanical, except the 
same are obtained from the State Agency and sold by the State 
Agent, his sub-agents, or the agents appointed by the different 
towns. The petitioners ask that this law may be so modified, as 
that the State Agency may cease to have the monopoly of the 
sale of liquors for medicinal and mechanical purposes, though 
allowing it still to furnish the town agents ; that druggists and 
apothecaries may be permitted, under proper restrictions, to sell 
for medicinal purposes, and that the other provisions of the law 
may be so far changed that, under proper restrictions, in such 
cities and towns as shall desire it, hotel-keepers, common victual- 
lers and certain other parties, may be permitted to sell. 

Before considering the main issues involved in this inquiry, 
there are three facts which meet us at the threshold. 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 7 

The first fact is the strength and character of the opposition 
to the present law. We do not propose here to balance the 
numbers of petitioners and remonstrants against each other, nor 
to attempt a comparison of their respective claims upon us by 
reason of their peculiar abilities, social position or experience. 
So invidious a task is immaterial to the point before us. Dis- 
avowing, therefore, any attempt to institute comparisons, or to 
overlook the numbers and character of the remonstrants, we 
say that it is a surprising fact, that if the existing statutes be 
sound in principle and fruitful of good results in practice, such 
a very large proportion of all the legal voters of the State 
should petition for a change. 

Again, among the witnesses for the petitioners there were very 
many men, whose characters and opportunities for information 
gave peculiar weight to their testimony. Several of the former 
governors of the State, a large majority of the municipal offi- 
cers of our cities, present and former judges, present and for- 
mer district-attorneys, eminent and revered ministers of the 
gospel of every denomination, city missionaries, a large body of 
our most distinguished medical men and chemists, sound and 
experienced business men, many total abstinence men — some 
of whom had advocated and been foremost in the enactment of 
the present law, — with very many others, coming from all parts 
of the State and looking at the questions at issue from their 
various points of view, testified in favor of a modification of the 
law. It is without precedent in the history of the legislation 
of this State, that a criminal statute should be so numerously 
opposed by men of this class and character. 

The second fact is, that this opposition is increasing-, instead 
of decreasing, and is more general, rather than less general, 
than it was a few years ago. Yery frequently there is a 
decided contest over the establishment of a new principle in 
legislation ; but in ordinary cases, if it is found to work toler- 
ably well, the old opposition gradually dies out and disappears. 
It is certainly a significant fact that the opposition to this law 
seems steadily to have increased. So long as the law was not 
enforced, there was comparatively little opposition to it. As 
soon as it is enforced, and the further that its principles are 
carried into execution, there spring up opponents on every side, 



8 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

not merely or chiefly those who are pecuniarily interested in 
the matter, but thousands of good citizens, who cannot be 
assumed to be controlled by any other motive than regard for 
the public good. If time has proved the wisdom and justice of 
the law, why is it that this opposition has increased, both in 
number and character, and that many of the former friends of 
the law proclaim their change of views ? 

The third fact is furnished by the supporters of the law them- 
selves, in the character of the legislation, designed by them from 
time to time to carry it out more efficiently. 

In our republican form of government, we have always 
recognized the fact that no criminal laws can be faithfully 
executed, (and therefore should not be enacted,) which are not 
sustained by the moral convictions of the people. When we 
make changes in them from time to time, we are content to 
leave the execution of the new laws with the ordinary instru- 
mentalities. For the administration of our entire criminal 
code, old laws and new laws, we have relied upon the vigilance 
of ordinary municipal officers to complain of violations ; the 
fidelity of prosecuting officers, elected by the people, to take 
charge of the complaints or indictments, when made or found ; 
the honor and good sense of juries, selected under long estab- 
lished and well known rules, to convict or acquit, according to 
the law and the evidence, — and the discretion of the judges, in 
case of conviction, to impose reasonable sentences. All these 
regular and ordinary methods were open for the execution of 
the statutes upon the sale of liquor. If the moral judgment of 
the people approved the law, there was no sufficient reason in 
the nature of things why police officers, district-attorneys, juries 
and judges should not be as prompt and decided in doing their 
respective duties by this as well as other laws. Yet the course 
of the supporters of the present statutes seems to indicate 
great distrust upon their part, of all these parties, or rather 
that there is something in the law so different from the princi- 
ples of our ordinary criminal legislation and so repugnant to 
the popular instincts, that new and arbitrary methods are 
necessary to enforce it. 

Every city and large town has its local police, which had 
been found effective enough in preserving the peace, and pros- 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 9 

editing violations of State and municipal laws. It is a force 
created by the municipalities, most interested in preserving 
order within their own limits. Yet the execution of this law 
could not, it was thought, be safely intrusted to them, because 
they were not sufficiently eager to prosecute ; and hence a sys- 
tem of State constabulary was adopted, until that time unknown 
in this country and in other republics, and borrowed from 
monarchical countries. 

So too in the disposal of other cases, after they have come 
before the criminal court, district-attorneys have been allowed 
to exercise their discretion, inasmuch as it was thought that 
these honorable officers would prosecute all offences and offend- 
ers impartially, and would not suspend or nol. pros, any prose- 
cution unless paramount considerations in the case of particu- 
lar offences or offenders required it. But the fifty-eighth sec- 
tion of the eighty-sixth chapter of the General Statutes requires 
these officers to give precedence in the disposal of their busi- 
ness to the cases arising under that chapter, (the prohibitory 
law,) over all other criminal cases, except those in which par- 
ties are actually imprisoned awaiting trial ; that they shall not 
enter nolle prosequi, or grant continuance in the case of any 
indictment for violation of that chapter, except upon written 
motion, filed by defendant, or written certificate by the 
prosecuting officer; and then that noL pros, shall not be 
entered except with the concurrence of the court. But even 
this extraordinary provision was not thought sufficient ; for by 
chapter 223 of the Acts 1865, it was further provided that no 
case under chapters eighty-six or eighty-seven of the General 
Statutes should be laid on file or disposed of, except by trial, 
judgment, acquittal or sentence, unless there was, first, a writ- 
ten, motion setting forth the specific reasons for such disposal ; 
second, an affidavit verifying the facts ; and third, a certificate 
of the presiding judge that he is satisfied that the cause exists, 
and that public justice requires such disposal, and that the 
court shall examine the dockets frequently to see that the above 
provisions are faithfully complied with. These strict enact- 
ments were designed to compel, and have compelled prosecut- 
ing officers to administer the law with a harshness not deemed 
necessary in the case of other laws. 

2 



10 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

Again, it was believed that juries in various parts of the 
Commonwealth, selected and empanelled in the ancient way, 
under a system entirely satisfactory until the enactment of the 
present law, would not sometimes convict in liquor cases, upon 
proper evidence, through the opposition to the law on the part 
of some of their number. Accordingly, during many sessions 
of the legislature attempts have been made, in several instances 
well nigh successful, for the avowed purpose of procuring more 
convictions in liquor cases, to change the system of trial by 
jury, either by excluding liquor-dealers from the panel, or all 
whose opinions would prevent them from convicting, or by 
giving to the prosecuting officer the right to challenge two 
peremptorily. 

Finally, the judges are not allowed to exercise the same 
discretion as to the punishment of these cases, as they are 
allowed in almost all other criminal cases, but must impose 
the same penalty upon all offenders, disregarding the circum- 
stances peculiar to each case, which ordinarily influence, 
and which the law has generally said should influence, the 
judicial mind. 

We have then a State police, whose chief duty it is to com- 
plain of violations of this law ; district-attorneys and judges 
placed under unusual and arbitrary restrictions in the trial 
and disposal of cases under it; and an almost successful 
attempt to change the system of jury trial. 

We have not intended in this enumeration to discuss the 
expediency of these various enactments. That question is 
foreign to this inquiry. We have referred to them, simply as 
indicating the judgment of the most prominent and earnest 
supporters of the present prohibitory law, that its execution 
cannot safely be intrusted to the ordinary officers and methods, 
sustained by the moral convictions of the people ; and, again, 
as indicating that the reason why its execution cannot be safely 
intrusted to them, is because in principle it differed so widely 
from other criminal legislation. Surely if the people thoroughly 
approved the law there would seem to be no occasion for these 
departures from our long established system in the administra- 
tion of criminal statutes. 

The three facts to which we have alluded, viz., the strength 
and character of the opposition to the present law, the steady 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 11 

increase of that opposition, and the extraordinary methods 
necessary, in the opinion of the friends of the law, for enforcing 
it, tend to raise serious doubts as to whether the law is ap- 
proved by the people ; and if not approved by the people, 
whether it is a just and proper criminal law. 



"We pass, however, from these preliminary considerations 
which, though they may properly influence the mind of legis- 
tors, having regard for the good sense of the people, should 
not control it, and come directly to an examination for our- 
selves of the theory and workings of the law. 

I. The Theory op the Law. 

We have said that the prominent feature of the law was its 
absolute prohibition of the sale of all intoxicating liquors, 
including therein, wine, ale, beer and cider, to be used as 
beverages, (excepting the sale by importers as above stated.) 
An absolute prohibition of the sale for use as a beverage is, of 
course, in effect an absolute prohibition of the use as a 
beverage. Is such absolute prohibition of the use right, wise 
or expedient? Is it fairly within the domain of legislative 
action ? Is it consonant with republican notions of the rights 
of the citizens ? Is it demanded by any imperative necessity ? 
Does it, in itself or as a precedent for similar legislation upon 
similar subjects, accomplish and promise to accomplish a cer- 
tain definite good, so great as to justify a resort to its severe 
and arbitrary provisions ? 

Some of the witnesses before the Committee testified that in 
their opinion the drinking of any quantity of wine, cider, beer 
or any intoxicating liquor, as a beverage, is in all cases a sin. 
If they are right, then the sale of liquor, to be used as a 
beverage is, in all cases, a sin. And if it is a sin in all cases 
to sell, then such sales should be absolutely prohibited, and 
every offender should be punished. But however conscientious 
these witnesses and those who agree with them may be in 
asserting this, the distinguished representatives of the remon- 
strants distinctly assured the Committee that that was not their 
opinion, nor, as they believed, that of the mass of the support- 
ers of the present law. The law, therefore, does not, in the 



12 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

opinion of any considerable number of its friends, rest upon 
the proposition that the use of intoxicating liquors as beverages 
is, in all cases and, of itself, sinful. 

Much medical and chemical testimony was introduced upon 
both sides, in regard to the dietetic uses of alcohol. Whether 
alcohol acts simply as a stimulant, or whether, in addition, it 
acts as food to the system, was discussed at great length, and 
with much learning. So long as scientific men differ widely 
upon this subject, the Committee would not presume to express 
an opinion ; nor is it necessary for the purposes of this inquiry. 
For whether the alcohol in wine, ale, beer, cider and other 
liquors acts simply as a stimulant, in the language of Dr. Car- 
penter, (cited in Appendix, p. 781,) " increasing for a time the 
■vital activity of the body, but being followed by a correspond- 
ing depression of power, which is the more prolonged and 
severe in proportion as the previous excitement has been 
greater," or whether, as stated by Dr. Edward H. Clarke, 
(Appendix, p. 386,) it " may produce the effect, of food in the 
system, under certain circumstances," by arresting the disinte- 
gration of the tissue, in either case it is very certain that from 
the earliest times to the present day, in every country, civilized 
and uncivilized, men universally have used alcoholic beverages 
to gratify a natural appetite and meet a real or supposed need 
of the system. And nature has surrounded us everywhere with 
the materials from which these beverages can be prepared by 
the simplest processes of distillation or fermentation. It is 
probable that scientific men will always differ in their opinions 
as to whether these beverages are beneficial or injurious. But 
if this is true, it can be yet more certainly said that each indi- 
vidual will always claim that he is the best judge, and is enti- 
tled to decide as to his particular need of them, and as to their 
effects upon himself. Some men may decide wrongly, some 
men may use alcoholic liquors excessively against their own 
better judgment ; still, they and all other men will, so long as 
it is conceded that the use is not in all cases sinful, assert the 
right to decide whether and to what extent they shall make it 
for themselves. 

Now the prohibitory law does not in its terms directly under- 
take to forbid the citizen from exercising this right. It is no 
offence to buy liquors for use as a beverage. It is no offence 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 13 

to use them as a beverage. No penalty is imposed upon either. 
Yet the prohibition of the sale is made, only because the pur- 
chase and the use, as a beverage, it is thought, should be pro- 
hibited. Suppose now that the law should in direct terms also 
prohibit the buying and the use, under the same penalties as 
the sale. Would there be any question that this would be gen- 
erally deemed an unjustifiable influence with the private rights 
and habits of the citizen ? Could it be distinguished in princi- 
ple from any sumptuary law ? and have not republican govern- 
ments wisely discarded such laws as relics of tyranny ? Every 
man would repudiate the legislation which would fine and 
imprison him for every case in which he used alcoholic liquors 
as a beverage. Indeed, our legislative records show that bills 
to punish the buyer of intoxicating liquor, equally with the 
seller, have repeatedly been rejected by almost unanimous 
votes. There are no reliable statistics to show what proportion 
of our population wholly abstain from the use of wine, ale, 
beer, cider and other liquors, as beverages. It is probably 
very small. There are probably no large communities in which 
a majority never drink any quantity of any of the prohibited 
liquors for other than medicinal purposes. In point of fact, a 
provision prohibiting the use as a beverage, under the penalties 
now imposed upon the seller, if enforced, would fine and 
imprison, at some time or other, almost all the male population 
of the State. 

Now the essential defect in the theory of the present law is, 
that it attempts by indirect methods to enforce the very prin- 
ciple of prohibition of the use as a beverage, which, in direct 
terms, is not and never would be incorporated into the law, 
and that that general and absolute prohibition of the use does 
not rest, as has been said, on the proposition which, if true, 
would logically support it, viz., that the use is in itself a sin. 
This defect is understood by the people. If the police officer, 
the district-attorney, the juror or the judge buys liquors for use 
as a beverage, and so uses them, conscious that he violates no 
law, divine or human, it is not surprising that he recoils at the 
idea of complaining against, prosecuting, convicting and sen- 
tencing to fine and imprisonment the man whose only offence 
may have been to sell these liquors. No sophistry can prevent 
people from taking this view of the law. The law is unsound 



14 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

in the assumptions on which it rests, and wrong in its punish- 
ment of the seller, instead of the buyer and the user. If it is 
wrong to use liquors as beverages, why not punish those who 
use them ? If the law studiously neglects to punish the buyer 
and the user, is it not strong proof that, in the opinion of those 
who framed it, the use is not wrong ? And if the use is not 
wrong, is there any sense or justice in punishing those who sell 
for the use ? 

But many say, that while every man has the absolute right 
to eat and drink as he pleases, still, that living in commu- 
nities as men do, he holds his absolute rights in subjection to 
the general good of the community ; that the general good of 
the community requires that all men should abstain from the 
use of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, not because it is sin- 
ful in itself, nor because it will injure all men, but because 
some men will use them improperly and excessively. Even if 
this proposition were correct, the defect in the law, to which 
we have alluded, — the punishment of the seller, instead of the 
buyer, — would not be cured, for that objection applies as 
strongly to this statement of the basis of the law, as to the first 
proposition, that the use is generally sinful or injurious. But 
passing by this serious defect in the method by which total 
abstinence is to be enforced, we say that it is beyond the legiti- 
mate scope of legislative action to attempt, by criminal enact- 
ments, to prevent the many from using these beverages because 
a few may abuse them. We are reminded that Paul said, " It 
is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor anything 
whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made 
weak ; " but it seems to us a strange perversion of the apostle's 
meaning, to say that the sublime rule of self-denial and self- 
sacrifice in all things which he enjoined as a moral precept, to 
operate upon the heart of the Christian, and guide his individ- 
ual course in his conduct towards his fellow-men, with its dif- 
ferent practical applications, according as circumstances might 
differ, should be enacted into an arbitrary criminal Act, and 
enforced by severe pains and penalties. 

That the excessive use of intoxicating liquors produces 
deplorable results, and that men should be most urgently coun- 
selled to abstain from such excessive use, and should be pun- 
ished by law if they disturb the peace of the community by 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 15 

reason of their excessive use, we are all agreed. That men 
inclined to be intemperate may be strongly and beneficially 
influenced by the example of total abstinence in others, when 
they see that total abstinence is enforced by the individual upon 
himself as an act of self-denial, for its benefit as an example, 
and does not result from a mere lack of desire to drink, or 
from an act of legislation compelling it, cannot be doubted. 
But it is not the province of law to undertake to satisfy the 
heart and mind of the citizen that he should practise temper- 
ance or total abstinence, and the law which undertakes to com- 
pel total abstinence on all will simply curtail the rights and 
liberties of the many, who may use liquors without injury, 
while it will fail to produce the moral change in the few who 
cannot use them without injury, sufficient to induce them to 
abstain. For unless that moral change is produced they will 
not cease to make the excessive use, and so long as the pro- 
hibitory law itself provides by its State Agency for the keeping 
of vast quantities of liquors, men with strong appetites will not 
fail to get them in some way. 

We sum up in three propositions our statement of the defects 
in the theory of the prohibitory law : — 

1. It is not sinful nor hurtful in every case to use every kind 
of alcoholic liquors as beverages. It is not, therefore, wrong 
in every case to sell every kind of alcoholic liquors to be used 
as beverages. But this law prohibits every sale of every kind 
of alcoholic liquors to be used as beverages. 

2. It is the right of every citizen to determine for himself 
what he will eat and drink. A law prohibiting him from drink- 
ing every kind of alcoholic liquors, universally used in all 
countries and ages as a beverage, is an arbitrary and unreason- 
able interference with his rights, and is not justified by the con- 
sideration that some men may abuse their rights, and may, 
therefore, need the counsel and example of good men to lead 
them to reform. But this law does, in theory, prohibit him 
from drinking every kind of alcoholic liquors, since it prohibits 
every sale of every kind of alcoholic liquors to' be used as 
a beverage. 

3. Finally, if the use should be totally prohibited, because it 
is either sinful or hurtful in all cases, or may be in some cases. 



16 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

the use should be punished. But this law punishes the sale, 
and does not punish the use. 

II. The Practical Results op the Law. 

We have endeavored to show that the law is unsound in 
theory. We come, now, to consider its practical workings ; 
how far it has been or can be executed ; how far it has checked, 
or is likely to check, intemperance ; and what other effects, 
good or bad, it has produced. 

In most, if not all, of the counties of the State, it is practi- 
cable to prosecute and convict open violators of the law, though 
with public sentiment in most of the cities and very many of 
the towns sustaining those who sell, whether hotel-keepers, 
grocers or apothecaries, this is not always possible. Still, as 
the State constabulary- has been almost doubled in numbers, 
and as they are very vigilant, it is not impossible that they will 
succeed in prosecuting successfully most of the open places. 

But the closing of the open places may not only not diminish 
the number of sellers, but may actually increase them. The 
evidence before the Committee, though of course to some 
extent conflicting, tended to show that in all those cities or 
towns where the prosecutions against open places had been the 
most active, an extraordinary number of secret places was 
started, and that more liquor and worse liquor were drunk, and 
that more intoxication ensued. According to the report of 
Deputy-Chief of Police Savage, (Appendix, p. 238,) the whole 
number of places in Boston, in which liquor was known to be 
sold, was 1,500 in 1854, and 1,515 in 1866. The number of 
drunken persons taken up by the police in 1854 was 6,983, 
while in 1866 it was 15,542, the largest number taken up 
during any year in the history of the city, except 1861 and 
1863, two of the years of the war, when the numbers were 
17,324 and 17,967, respectively. The number of drunkards in 
1866 exceeds that of 1865 by 1,657. Again, the State con- 
stabulary during the months of January and February, 1867, 
made more efficient prosecution of violations of the law than 
had ever been made in the city, yet the number of drunken 
persons taken up in January was 1,462, and in February, 
1,570, against 1,118 in January, 1853, and 1,059 in February, 
1863, the war year referred to, when the largest number of 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 17 

drunken persons was taken up. If the number of cases for 
1867 is calculated upon the basis of the returns for January 
and February, it will amount to 18,192. 

Rev. James A. Healey, pastor of a very large Catholic 
church, and visiting extensively among the poorer classes, 
says, (p. 191,) " that in almost every house they have liquor 
and they sell to those in the house." Mayor Norcross says 
that " drunkenness increases." Ex-Mayor Lincoln says " that 
the sale of ardent spirits and the number of drunkards have 
increased faster than our population has increased." And 
without attempting to give the names even of the numerous 
witnesses who testified in regard to the present condition of 
things in Boston, it can be safely asserted that while the num- 
ber of open places has undoubtedly somewhat diminished, all of 
the principal hotels, grocers, restaurants, apothecaries and 
wholesale liquor-dealers sell openly, an immense and constantly 
increasing number of secret places and " clubs " has been 
established, drunkenness has increased almost in a direct ratio 
with the closing of public places, and there is now more of it 
than at any previous time in the history of the city. 

In Cambridge, Prof. Bowen says, (p. 314,) " it is as easy to 
buy liquor now as it is to buy bread, and it can be had, even 
at a greater number of places." 

In Lowell, the Hon. E. B. Patch says, (p. 244,) " I think the 
sale of liquor was never more free than it is at the present 
time. I believe that every dealer sells it in the most open man- 
ner, as much they please, and to whom they please." 

In Charlestown, Judge Warren, formerly mayor, says, (p. 
185,) " I should say that intemperance did not diminish." " I 
understood the present United States collector to say that two 
hundred licenses had been granted in Charlestown the present 
year." 

In New Bedford, City Marshal Brownell says, (p. 336,) the 
law "has closed up the places of public sale." " I think that 
intemperance or drunkenness is just about the same." 

In Fall River, Ex-Mayor Buffington says, (p. 339,) " most 
of the public places of the better class that did sell, have been 
forced, some of them, to close, and in the winter, when the 
largest amount of seizures was made, the arrests for drunken- 
ness were the largest of any in the year." 

3 



18 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

In Worcester, Ex-Mayor Lincoln says, (p. 350,) the law 
" has not substantially suppressed the sale of liquor nor 
diminished the cases of drunkenness." 

In Lynn, Mayor Usher says, (p. 6QQ,*) " I do not think there 
is an open bar in the city." " There are said to be secret clubs 
where they buy liquor by the quantity and resort to drink it." 

In Springfield, the Rev. Mr. Ide says, (p. 354,) " the sale of 
liquor is about as open as the doors are." 

In Pittsfield, Judge Page says, (p. 375,) " intemperance has 
increased faster than the population." 

Upon a careful inquiry into the present condition of things 
throughout the State, it would probably appear that in the 
small towns there is hardly any liquor sold, but that in all the 
large cities and towns it can be had without difficulty ; that in 
most of them the sales are open, and that whenever by 
peculiarly vigorous efforts the open places are closed, large 
numbers of secret places are established and the cases of 
drunkenness largely increased. The mere fact that the law 
seeks to prevent them from drinking, rouses the determination 
to drink in many ; the fact that the place is secret takes away 
the restraint upon them, which in more public and respectable 
places would keep them within temperate bounds. The fact 
that the business is contraband and liable to interruption, and 
its gains hazardous, tends to drive honest men from it and to 
leave it in the control of dishonest men who will not -scruple to 
poison the community with vile adulterations. 

Another serious result in the operations of the present law 
is the immoral business practices which it has suggested and 
sanctioned. A man without violating any law may purchase 
liquors to the extent of his credit, and then repudiate the debt. 
Though the liquors as articles of commerce are worth to him 
all he agreed to pay, the law permits him to hold them without 
making payment. Still further, a man may put all his property 
into liquors and so escape the payment of any of his debts, for 
his liquors cannot be attached, as the officer will violate the 
law in selling them upon execution. They cannot be distrained 
for his taxes even, for the government officer is liable to prose- 
cution if he sells. These attempts to outlaw a commercial 
article whose place in trade has been undisputed for centuries, 
have had no effect in preventing honest men from paying their 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 19 

debts, but they have held out temptations too powerful to be 
resisted by swindlers. It is unworthy of the good name of the 
Commonwealth that her laws should protect and encourage a 
man who has bought merchandise, without violating the law, 
in refusing to pay the price thereof to the seller. It is 
unworthy of the State that dishonest men should be enabled to 
escape the .payment of their debts by converting their property 
into liquors. It is not less unworthy that the State herself, 
should, without compensation, seize and sell for her own benefit 
articles of merchandise which the citizen has bought in 
violation of no law. 



The Committee believe that the time has come when this 
prohibitory law, unsound in theory, inconsistent with the 
traditional rights and liberties of the people, tempting to fraud 
and protecting those who commit it, in many communities not 
enforced because of thorough disbelief in its principles, in other 
communities, when enforced, driving the liquor traffic into 
secret places and so increasing rather than diminishing, the 
amount of drunkenness and other crimes, should be so far 
modified as that the rights of the citizen will be respected, while? 
at the same time, the general peace and order of the community 
will be better promoted. Let the law cease to attempt to 
interfere arbitrarily with what a man shall drink, while, nev- 
ertheless, it places such regulations as experience has shown* 
to be necessary over the persons who may make the sale and 
the times and places when and where the sales shall be made. 
Let it be regarded as a fact that the demand on the part of 
those who desire, wisely or unwisely, to use liquors as a bever- 
age, has always been met, and always will be met, by men who 
will sell, either under the law, or in defiance of the law, and 
that wise legislation should recognize and act upon that fact. 

The Committee have not undertaken to cure all the evils 
arising under the present system ; but the Bill which they 
report herewith seeks to remedy the main defects in the theory 
and operations of the law. It does not repeal any provisions 
of the existing statutes, nor change any of the machinery by 
which the law is enforced, but it provides for two classes of sales 
to which the penalties of the existing statutes shall not apply. 



20 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

First. It shall be lawful for any person to sell cider or beer, 
containing less than three per cent, of alcohol, (the same not 
being intoxicating,) provided he records his intention to sell 
with the city or town clerk and gives the officers of the law 
opportunity, at any time, to examine his premises and liquors. 

The Committee were satisfied, upon the evidence before them, 
that it was a fatal mistake on the part of the leaders in the 
so-called temperance movement to attempt to prohibit the sale 
of cider and light beer. It is probably possible by persistent 
application for a man to take enough of either of these liquors 
to become intoxicated, but it is contrary to all experience to say 
that the ordinary use of these liquors produces intoxication. 
In many parts of the State cider is generally manufactured and 
used as a beverage ; in other parts of the State light beers are 
made and used in large quantities, and the law, so far from 
prohibiting either, ought, in our opinion, in the interests of true 
temperance, to encourage their substitution for the stronger 
and more dangerous liquors. 

Second. Licenses may be granted by the county commission- 
ers in any city or town, which shall not otherwise provide, upon 
the recommendation of the local authorities, to either one or all 
of these three classes, viz. : — 

1. Licensed hotel-keepers and common victuallers to sell to 
their guests, the liquor to be drank upon the premises. 

2. Wholesale and retail dealers to sell, in proper quantities, 
to persons carrying the liquor away from the premises. 

3. Druggists and apothecaries to sell only for use in medi- 
t)'m-e, cooking and the arts. 

Stringent conditions are to be inserted in the licenses, pro- 
viding, among other things, that no public bar shall be kept 
upon the premises, that no sale shall be made on the Lord's 
Day or to minors or intoxicated or other unsuitable persons, 
that the premises and liquors shall always be open to inspection 
by State and municipal officers, and that the license shall be 
revoked upon breach of any of its conditions. It is believed 
that the law is so strictly guarded that while it will enable 
cities and towns to permit liquors to be sold within their limits, 
it will give them opportunity and power to enforce rigid observ- 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 21 

ance of the terms of the license. The Committee do not claim 
that the principal result of this law will be to reduce the quan- 
tity of liquor sold. They have no doubt that it will have that 
effect in some localities ; but, as has been said, the quantity 
sold will always depend mainly upon the demand. But the 
law will put the sale into the hands of respectable and honest 
men, and thereby insure a better quality of liquors, and prevent 
the sale of the poisonous stuff which produces most of the pres- 
ent drunkenness. The law will be sustained by the moral con- 
victions of the people, because it will no longer attempt, though 
indirectly, to prohibit them absolutely from using every kind of 
alcoholic beverages. 

Besides, the law will then permit regular druggists and apoth- 
ecaries to sell liquors, as they always sold them prior to the 
passage of the prohibitory statute, without requiring them to 
assume the office and duties of city or town liquor agent. The 
testimony presented by the College of Pharmacy fully satisfied 
the Committee that this modification of the law was demanded 
by common sense and humanity. It should never happen 
again, as in the case of a respectable man at f North Bridgewater, 
that a regular apothecary should be prosecuted, convicted and 
punished under the laws of the Commonwealth for selling alco- 
hol for a jeweller's lamp, and a bottle of wine, ordered by a 
physician for a dying woman, after the town liquor agency had 
been applied to in vain for it. 

The Committee earnestly suggest to the legislature, as the 
result of their observation during the present investigation, 
that it is the part of wisdom to heed and answer the petitions 
which have come to us from every part of the Commonwealth. 
If it is done now, and in the manner indicated by them, they 
believe that the State will then have a law upon the sale of liquors, 
more strict in its practical operations than any that exists now 
in any country of the world ; while at the same time the rights 
and liberties of the citizens will be respected. Unless this is 
done, and done speedily, there is every indication that in the 
popular reaction which is sure to follow this extreme prohibi- 
tory legislation, the good points in the law will be swe^t away 
with the bad, and the Commonwealth obliged to begin again in 



22 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

its attempts to legislate upon the sale of liquor. As good citi- 
zens, whose only interest is to promote the highest good of the 
State, we should not be deterred by prejudice or pride of opin- 
ion, or the mistaken judgments of good men, from reforming 
in season a law unsound in theory and bad in practice. • 

K. M. MORSE, Jr., Norfolk, 

H. ALEXANDER, Jr., Hampden, 

MOSES A. DOW, Middlesex, 

On the part of the Senate, 

HARVEY JEWELL, Boston, 
WM. H. P. WRIGHT, Lawrence, 
EDWARD AVERY, Braintree, 
ALVIN G. BARTLETT, Roxbury, 
H. A. MADDEN, Boston, 

On the part of the House. 



1867.] 



HOUSE— No. 415. 



23 



NUMBER OF MALE PETITIONERS AND REMONSTRANTS, ARRANGED 

BY COUNTIES. 

[Previous to May 8th.] 



COUNTIES. 


Total Vote in 1866, 
for Governor. 


Petitioners. 


Eemonstrants. 


Berkshire, 








6,373 


2,189 


805 


Bristol, . • 








6,787 


2,205 


2,332 


Barnstable, 








2,361 


. - 


505 


Essex, . 








17,136 


2,477 


5,599 


Franklin, 








3,895 


453 


1,112 


Hampshire, 








4,104 


1,251 


437 


Hampden, 








6,101 


2,545 


686 


Middlesex, 








22,778 


7,056 


3,531 


Norfolk, . 








11,259 


754 


1,936 


Plymouth, 








6,770 


697 


1,610 


Suffolk, . 








14,754 


11,885 


2,987 


Worcester, 








15,607 


2,100 


4,242 


Dukes, . 








454 


- 


81 


Nantucket, 






* 


370 


352 


- 










118,749 


34,963 


25,863 



24 LICENSE LAW. [May, 



(ftommotttDcalif) o( JitassarijuscitSN 



In the Year One Thousand Eight Hundred and Sixty 

Seven. 



AN ACT 



To regulate the Sale of Spirituous and Intoxicating 

Liquors. 

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 
tives, in General Court assembled, and by the authority oj 
the same, as follows :■ — 

1 Sect. 1. The county commissioners of the several 

2 counties, in the several towns of said counties, and 

3 the mayor and aldermen of the several cities, in their 

4 respective cities, may grant licenses to sell wines, ale, 

5 beer and other spirituous liquors : 

6 (1.) To licensed inn-holders and common victual- 

7 lers, to sell the same to their guests or persons 

8 resorting to their establishments for meals, food or 

9 lodging, to be drank on their premises. 

10 (2.) To such number of persons as they shall 

11 decide the convenience of their respective cities or 

12 towns require, to sell such liquors at wholesale or 

13 retail, in quantities of not less than one gallon, except 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 25 

14 in case when such liquors are commonly sold in pack- 

15 ages of less than one gallon, and in such case in 

16 such packages. 

17 (3.) To such number of regular apothecaries and 

18 druggists as they shall decide the necessity or con- 

19 venience of their several cities or towns requires; 

20 such apothecaries and druggists to have power and 

21 authority to sell such liquors only to be used in the 

22 arts and for culinary and medicinal purposes. 

1 Sect. 2. All licenses granted under the authority 

2 of this act shall expire on the first day of May in 

3 each year, and may be granted at any time during the 

4 year for the remainder thereof. 

1 Sect. 3. No license shall be granted in any year 

2 to either of the classes of persons in the first section 

3 mentioned in any city or town in which the city 

4 council of said city, in the month of March in said 

5 year, or the inhabitants of said town at a legal meet- 

6 ing thereof, held in the month of March in said year, 

7 or for the present year at meetings of city councils or 
S of the inhabitants of towns within sixty days from 
9 the passage of this act, shall have passed a vote 

10 that no licenses shall be granted, or that licenses 

11 shall be granted only to one or more of said 

12 classes of persons in said section mentioned, in 

13 which latter case licenses may be granted to 

14 persons of the class not included in such vote of 

15 prohibition ; and it shall be lawful for the city 

16 council of such cities, and the inhabitants of such 

17 towns, at legal meetings called for that purpose, to 

18 fix a sum, which shall be paid by either of the classes 



26 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

19 of persons to the treasurer of said city or town, as 

20 the case may be, before any license shall be delivered 

21 to any person ; and any license granted to any one of 

22 either of said classes of persons shall be delivered by 

23 the mayor and aldermen or county commissioners, 

24 only on payment of the sum fixed by such city or 

25 town. 

1 Sect. 4. No license shall be granted to any per- 

2 son by the county commissioners in any town, unless 

3 the person applying for the same shall be recom- 

4 mended as a suitable person to receive such license, 

5 by a majority of the board of selectmen of the town 

6 in which he resides and proposes to carry on his 

7 business ; and on written request of the selectmen of 

8 any town made to the county commissioners, the said 

9 commissioners shall forthwith revoke the license 

10 granted to any person, upon the recommendation of 

11 such selectmen. 

1 Sect. 5. All licenses granted under the provisions 

2 of this act, shall be upon the following conditions, to 

3 be inserted therein : — 

4 (1.) That the licensee shall not keep or maintain a 

5 public bar. 

6 (2.) That the licensee shall not, on the Lord's Day, 

7 sell or give away to any person whatever any of the 

8 liquors prohibited by law to be sold, nor any cider, 

9 beer or malt liquors, except in the case of a licensed 

10 druggist or apothecary, who shall be permitted to sell 

11 such liquors only in cases of necessity or on the pre- 

12 scription of a physician. 

13 (3.) That the license shall be at any time revocable 

14 by the authority granting the same ; or by any court, 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 27 

15 on conviction of the licensee of a violation of the 

16 conditions of the license. 

17 (4.) That the licensee will at all times permit the 

18 liquors so kept by him to be examined, on demand 

19 of the mayor or board of aldermen, chief of police or 

20 city marshal of any city, or by any police officer by their 

21 direction, or by the constable of the Commonwealth, or 

22 any of his deputies by his direction, or by the select- 

23 men of any town, or any constable by their direction, 

24 and will furnish, when required by any of the persons 

25 named as aforesaid, true samples of any and all 

26 liquors kept by him for examination by the state 

27 assayer, the expense of such assay to be paid by such 

28 licensee ; and if such liquor be found not to be pure 

29 and of good quality, the same shall be liable to be 

30 seized by any officer upon proper complaint, and dis- 

31 posed of as in the case of seizure made under the 

32 provisions of chapter eighty-six of the General 

33 Statutes. 

34 (5.) That the licensee will knowingly sell no liquors 

35 to any minor, nor to any student of any academy, high 

36 school, normal school or college, and will sell to no 

37 intoxicated person, and will not sell to any person 

38 whose wife shall have notified such licensee not to 

39 sell to her husband. 

40 (6.) That all liquor sold shall be taken and carried 

41 away at one time, and not be drank upon the prem- 

42 ises of the licensee, except in cases of licensed inn- 

43 keepers and victuallers. 

44 (7.) That the licensee shall carry on his business 

45 only in the place to be designated particularly in his 

46 license by the number of the building and the name 

47 of the street, lane, alley or other place where he 

48 proposes to exercise his employment. 



28 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

1 Sect. 6. On complaint of any person on oath 

2 before a trial justice, police court, or the municipal 

3 court of the city of Boston, setting forth any specific 

4 breach or breaches of his license by any person licensed 

5 under the provisions of this act, or of the provisions 

6 of section twelve of the eighty-sixth chapter of the 

7 General Statutes, verified by oath, the justice or court 

8 shall issue a citation to such licensed person to 

9 appear and show cause why his license should not be 

10 revoked ; and if, upon a hearing of said complaint, it 

11 shall appear to such justice or court that the defend- 

12 ant has broken the conditions of his license as alleged 

13 in said complaint, the same shall be declared to be 

14 revoked and annulled, and all authority under the 

15 same shall be deemed to have ceased on the day of 

16 the service of such citation on the defendant; but 

17 the defendant shall have the right to appeal, as in 

18 case of defendants in criminal proceedings ; and if, 

19 upon final hearing of the said complaint, the same 

20 shall be sustained, the license shall be decreed to be 

21 annulled and revoked, and judgment shall be entered 

22 against the defendant for the costs of the proceedings, 

23 and he shall be also liable to complaint or indictment 

24 under the provisions of chapters eighty-six and eighty- 

25 seven of the General Statutes and the acts in addition 

26 thereto, and to all the penalties provided in the same 

27 for all acts done by him after service upon him of the 

28 citation in this section mentioned, in the same man- 

29 ner and to the same extent as if his license had been 

30 revoked at that time, and the fact of such license shall 

31 be no defence as to any act done after the service 

32 upon him of such citation. 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 29 

1 Sect. 7. It shall be lawful for any person who 

2 shall comply with the provisions of this section to 

3 manufacture and keep for sale and sell cider, and 

4 also to manufacture and keep and sell beer and malt 

5 liquors which do not contain more than three per 

6 cent, of alcohol, except upon the Lord's day. Every 

7 person except persons licensed under the provisions 

8 of this act, w T ho proposes to sell cider or to manufac- 

9 ture or sell beer and malt liquors, as provided in this 

10 section, shall, before he commences such manufacture 

11 or sale, file with the city clerk or town clerk of the 

12 place where he proposes to manufacture or to* make 

13 such sales, a written notice of his intention so to do, 

14 setting forth his name, and the name of the street, lane 

15 or alley, with the number of the building if the build- 

16 ing shall be numbered, or if not numbered, such a 

17 description of the building and the location thereof 

18 as shall be sufficient with reasonable certainty to des- 

19 ignate the same, where he proposes to carry on such 

20 business, which notice shall be renewed in the 

21 month of April, in every year. All such notices 
'22 shall be recorded by the city clerk or town clerk, in 

23 books to be kept by him for that purpose, and for 

24 such notice he shall be paid the sum of one dollar. 

25 It shall be lawful for the mayor or aldermen, chief of 

26 police or city marshal, or any constable or police 

27 officer of any city, the selectmen or constables or 

28 police officers of any town, or the constable of the 

29 Common weath or any of his deputies, to enter into 

30 any such place and inspect the same for the purpose 

31 of ascertaining the manner in which such persons 

32 conduct their business, and do all other things neces- 

33 sary to keep order therein, and to examine any and 



30 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

34 all liquors of every kind there found ; and on demand 

35 made by any such officer upon any person found in 

36 charge of such place, or engaged in any business 

37 therein, true samples of all liquors there found shall 

38 be delivered to the officer, for examination and assay 

39 by the state assayer; and if such officer shall have 

40 reasonable cause to believe the same are not of the 

41 kind or quality of liquors mentioned in this section, 

42 he may make complaint as is provided in cases of 

43 seizure in chapter eighty-six of the General Statutes ; 

44 and if upon examination and assay of such liquors, 

45 the same are found not to be of the kind or quality 

46 described in this section, the said liquors may be pro- 

47 ceeded against in the manner provided in case of 

48 seizures in the provisions of chapter eighty-six of 

49 the General Statutes, and the keeper of such place 

50 shall be liable to all the penalties provided in chapters 

51 eighty-six and eighty-seven of the General Statutes, 

52 and the acts in addition to the same. In all cases of 

53 complaint or indictment of any person for a violation 

54 of the provisions of chapters eighty-six or eighty- 

55 seven, the burden shall be upon the defendant, to 

56 show that he has given the required notice to the 

57 city clerk or town clerk, and so has acquired the 

58 right to sell the liquors in this section mentioned. 

1 Sect. 8. Licensed manufacturers of spirituous or 

2 intoxicating liquors, in addition to the sales author- 

3 ized to be made by them by section twelve of the 

4 eighty-sixth chapter of the General Statutes, may 

5 sell any of the liquors manufactured by them, in 

6 quantities not less than thirty gallons, to any party 

7 licensed as is herein provided, and the bond to be 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 31 

8 given by such manufacturer, as required by section 

9 thirteen of said act, shall be modified accordingly. 

1 Sect. 9. None of the provisions and penalties of 

2 existing laws against the sale, or the keeping for sale, 

3 of intoxicating or spirituous liquors, shall apply to 

4 parties, or their business, who hold licenses under this 

5 act while such license remains in full force and 

6 unrevoked, and while the parties holding the same 

7 faithfully comply with and fully perform all the con- 

8 ditions thereof, except as provided in the sixth section 

9 of this act. 

1 Sect. 10. The places of business and liquors kept 

2 therein for sale, of all parties receiving licenses under 

3 this act, shall at all times be subject to inspection by 

4 the mayors or any of the aldermen, or any of the 

5 police officers of cities, or the state constable, or any 

6 of his deputies, or by the selectmen of towns, or by 

7 the police officers or constables of such towns, 

8 for the purpose of ascertaining the manner in which 

9 such licensed parties conduct their business; and 

10 such officers shall at all times have the right for 

11 the purposes aforesaid, to enter said places of busi- 

12 ness, and to do all things necessary to preserve order 

13 therein, and secure the due observance of the law by 

14 the proprietors and managers of said licensed places. 

15 Any resistance or obstruction of any of said officers 

16 while in the due execution of the powers herein con- 

17 ferred, by the proprietor or occupant of such place of 

18 business, .or by his employees or servants by his 

19 direction, shall be deemed and taken as a forfeiture of 

20 the license held by such proprietor or occupant. 



32 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

1 Sect 11. Nothing in this act shall affect any 

2 offences heretofore committed, or the punishment of 

3 the same, or any proceedings now pending. 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 33 



MINORITY REPORT. 



House of Representatives, May 14, 1867. 

The undersigned, a minority of the Committee, to whom were 
referred the Petitions of Alpheus Hardy and others, asking 
for the enactment of "A judicious License Law, for the 
regulation and control of the sale of spirituous and fermented 
liquors in the Commonwealth," and to whom was also referred 
the Petition of the officers and trustees of the Massachu- 
setts College of Pharmacy, for an alteration of " the present 
law, in such way that the apothecaries may be able to con- 
duct their business in a legal manner," and to whom were 
also referred numerous Remonstrances against the passage of 
a license law,— being unable to agree with a majority of the 
Committee in the conclusions which they have reached, 
respectfully submit the following 

REPORT: 

We propose to consider the petitions of Mr. Hardy and others 
first, and that of the College of Pharmacy afterwards. It is 
claimed that there are about thirty-five thousand signers to the 
petitions for a license law. 

The number of remonstrances is about three hundred and 
seventy, coming from at least two hundred towns and cities of 
the Commonwealth ; from nine " temperance unions," each 
union embracing several towns; from a large number of 
churches and Sunday schools ; from nine Christian conventions, 
held in different parts of the State ; from the New England 
Methodist Episcopal Conference ; from several associations of 
Congregational clergymen, and from numerous temperance 
organizations ; from the president and students of Williams 
College ; from the faculty and students of Andover Theological 
Seminary ; from one hundred and sixty-three students of 
5 



34 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

Amherst College, and from more than two hundred and fifty 
clergymen of Massachusetts. 

The number of remonstrants given, is between sixty and 
seventy thousand. There are several remonstrances from socie- 
ties and organizations wherein the numbers are not given. It 
is believed that the number represented by this last class of 
remonstrances, added to the number given, would make the 
whole number of remonstrants not less than eighty thousand. 

The subject-matter of these petitions is not new, nor are the 
facts and arguments offered in support of them novel. 

The law now in force in this Commonwealth, regulating the 
manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors, was passed in the 
year 1855. Numerous unsuccessful attempts have been made 
from year to year since that time, to induce the legislature to 
repeal or modify this law. The present attempt has not dif- 
fered from those which have preceded it, except, perhaps, there 
has been a more elaborate preparation and presentation of the 
evidence, and certainly there has been greater learning, ability 
and eloquence displayed in the discussions before the Commit- 
tee. But the essential character of this effort to induce a 
change in the existing law, does not differ from those which 
have heretofore been so often made without success. The sub- 
ject to which these petitions relate is one which has, for many 
years, occupied the public attention. It is one with which 
every intelligent citizen is familiar, — one upon which he has 
clear and well settled opinions, — founded upon evidence so 
ample and substantial, and so entirely within the reach of all 
honest inquirers after truth, that they are not likely to be dis- 
turbed or unsettled by the half resolved and disputed theories 
of scientific speculators. 

To those who know that the prisons of the country, as well 
as the poor-houses and hospitals, have, from year to year and 
from generation to generation, been filled with the victims of 
intemperance, the speculations of the scientific schools as to 
whether alcohol is respiratory or plastic food, or indeed food at 
all, seem but learned trifles, when offered as the basis of intelli- 
gent legislation. It has appeared to us that the petitioners, 
while pursuing these lines of inquiry into the regions of curious 
and recondite scientific discoveries or guesses, have quite mis- 
apprehended and misstated the grounds on which all laws upon 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 35 

the subject under consideration are and should be founded. 
The late most distinguished Chief Justice Shaw, in giving the 
opinion of the court in a case which arose under the first Maine 
Law, as it was called, passed in this State in the year 1852, 
said : " We have no doubt that it is competent for the legisla- 
ture to declare the possession of certain articles of property, 
either absolutely, or when held in particular places and under 
particular circumstances, to be unlawful, because they wo.uld be 
injurious, dangerous, or noxious ; and by due process of law, 
to provide both for the abatement of the nuisance and the pun- 
ishment of the offender, by seizure and confiscation of the prop- 
erty, by the removal, sale or destruction of the noxious 
articles." 

In another case arising under an earlier statute, upon this 
same general subject, the same eminent judge said : " The court 
rests its decision upon the proposition that to promote the 
peace, order and security of the community, to prevent the 
evils of vice, riot, pauperism, and the temptation to crime," 
government has the right to regulate and control the sale of 
spirituous liquor or the places where it is to be sold. 

The late chief justice of the supreme court of the United 
States, in giving his opinion in what are called the license 
cases, (5 Howard, 504,) says : " Every State may regulate its own 
internal traffic, according to its own judgment, and upon its 
own views of the interest and well-being of its citizens. Al- 
though a State is bound to receive and to permit the sale by 
the importer of any article of merchandise which Congress 
authorizes to be imported, it is not bound to furnish a market 
for it, nor to abstain from the passage of any law which it may 
deem necessary or advisable to guard the health or morals of 
its citizens, although such law may discourage importations, or 
diminish the profits of the importer, or lessen the revenue of 
the general government. And if any State deems the retail 
and internal traffic in ardent spirits injurious to its citizens and 
calculated to produce idleness, vice or debauchery, I see nothing 
in the constitution of the United States to prevent it from reg- 
ulating and restraining the traffic, or from prohibiting it 
altogether." 

Justice McLean in the same cases says : " If the foreign 
article (spirits) be injurious to the health or morals of the com- 



36 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

munity, a State may, in the exercise of that great and conser- 
vative police power which lies at the foundation of its prosperity, 
prohibit the sale of it." 

Justice Grier, in the same cases, says : " The true question 
presented by these cases is whether the States have a right to 
prohibit the sale and consumption of an article of commerce 
which they believe to be pernicious in its effects and the cause 
of disease, pauperism and crime. It is not necessary for the 
sake of justifying the State legislation now under considera- 
tion, to array the appalling statistics of misery, pauperism and 
crime which have their origin in the use or abuse of ardent 
spirits. The police power which is exclusively in the State, is 
alone competent to the correction of these great evils, and all 
measures of restraint or prohibition necessary to effect the pur- 
pose are within the scope of that authority ; and if a loss of 
revenue should accrue to the United States from a diminished 
consumption of ardent spirits, she will be the gainer a thousand 
fold in the wealth and happiness of the people." 

These practical expositions of the duties and rights of gov- 
ernment, given under the high responsibility of official trust, 
by those whose life-long business it has been to study and 
expound the constitution and laws under which we live, and are 
now acting, set forth in a clear and forcible manner the true 
grounds on which the system of laws we are considering rests. 
And they stand in striking contrast to the opinions expressed 
by several witnesses who appeared before the Committee to 
declare, with but little apparent reflection upon the subject, that 
a law prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquors was an unau- 
thorized exercise of power on the part of government, and 
an unjust infringement of private rights. It is undoubtedly 
true that the opinions from which the foregoing citations are 
made, were given in exposition and illustration of the relative 
powers and duties of the general and State governments. But 
they also unequivocally show, that the States have the power, 
in the exercise of that great conservative right of self-preserva- 
tion, to pass laws restraining or wholly prohibiting the sale of 
" articles of commerce " which are found to be productive of 
irreparable injury to the community. And if there is a bene- 
ficial and an injurious use which may be made of such articles, 
then beyond all controversy the State may permit the first and 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 37 

prohibit the latter. And it would be as clearly a violation of 
all moral duty on the part of government to license, and thus 
legalize the injurious use, as it would be a wanton and despotic 
exercise of power to forbid the beneficial use, if the one can be 
separated from the other. And it is upon thisjprecise distinc- 
tion that the system of laws under discussion is founded. In 
this connection, and in reference to the opinions of witnesses 
to whom allusion has just been made, we cannot forbear to 
quote the language of Rev. Dr. Channing when discoursing 
upon the rights of government in relation to this class of 
laws : — " This is a case which stands by itself, which can be 
confounded with no other, and on which government from its 
very nature and end is particularly bound to act. Let it never 
be forgotten that the great end of government, its highest func- 
tion, is not to make roads, grant charters, originate improve- 
ments, but to prevent or redress crimes against individual 
rights and social order. For this end it ordains a criminal 
code. Now if it be true that a vast proportion of the crimes 
which government is instituted to prevent and redress, have 
their origin in the use of ardent spirits, if our poor-houses, 
work-houses, jails and penitentiaries are tenanted in great 
degree by those whose first and chief impulse to crime came 
from the distillery and the dram-shop, if murder and theft, the 
most fearful outrages on property and life, are most frequently 
the issues and consummation of intemperance, is not govern- 
ment bound to restrain by legislation the vending of the 
stimulus to these terrible social wrongs ? " 

Having thus exhibited the principle on which the laws in 
question are based, and that they are in complete harmony 
with the twofold government {State and Federal,) under 
which we live, let us next inquire what modifications or 
changes are sought for by the petitioners. At the close of their 
evidence, their counsel submitted the following propositions as 
embodying the essential principles of such a license law as they 
would have the legislature adopt : — 

" 1. That die several municipalities of the Commonwealth be allowed 
by law to permit the retail sale, under municipal regulation, and subject 
also to police regulation by the Commonwealth, of spirituous and fer- 
mented liquors, by taverners, victuallers, grocers and apothecaries; 



38 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

licenses being granted, in such numbers and to such persons as the 
public convenience may, in the judgment of the municipality, require. 

" 2. All licensed places shall be subject to police visitation, and the 
liquors kept for sale shall be subject to inspection under superintendence 
of a board of commissioners appointed by the governor ; such regula- 
tions being enacted by law relative thereto as will best promote the 
purity of the liquors offered for sale, and guard the people against 
imposition by adulteration or otherwise. 

" 3. The existing provisions of law which forbid the manufacture of 
cider and its sale by the manufacturer, and those also which forbid the 
sale of spirituous and fermented liquors at wholesale (or in quantities of 
not less than twenty-eight gallons in each package,) and those which 
forbid their manufacture to be sold according to law, should be repealed. 

"4. The provisions of the existing statutes shall remain in force 
against all persons manufacturing or selling contrary to law, whether 
without license or in violation of their license." 

They complain that the present prohibitory law, as it is 
called, is too restrictive, that it transcends the legitimate sphere 
of government and invades the rights of the citizen. And they 
affirm that it cannot be enforced or executed as it now stands. 

The law, against which these grave charges are made, though 
called prohibitory, is in fact a law to regulate the manufacture 
and sale of intoxicating liquors. It authorizes the manufacture 
of these liquors and their sale by the manufacturer in quanti- 
ties not less than thirty gallons, to be exported or to be used in 
the arts or for mechanical and chemical purposes in this State. 

It allows their sale by duly appointed agents in every town 
and city in the Commonwealth, to be used in the arts or for 
mechanical, medicinal and chemical purposes. 

A chemist, artist or manufacturer in whose trade they may 
be necessary, may keep at his place of business spirituous 
liquors for use in such art or trade, and any person may man- 
ufacture or sell cider in any quantity for other purposes than 
that of a beverage. 

The- importer of liquors of foreign production may sell the 
same in original packages. 

And under the provisions of this law every respectable drug- 
gist and apothecary in the Commonwealth can be appointed an 
agent ivith authority to sell the liquors named, for all the legal 
purposes above enumerated. 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 39 

And the law further provides for the appointment of a Com- 
missioner, whose duty it shall be to supply all these agencies. 
And all liquors kept for sale by him, shall be analyzed by one 
of the State assayers, and no spirituous and intoxicating liquors 
are to be sold by him except such as one of said assayers in 
writing certifies to be pure. Thus it will be seen that this law, 
almost universally spoken of as prohibitory, is one of regula- 
tion, and contains the most ample and elaborate provisions for 
the supply and distribution of spirituous liquors to every part 
of the Commonwealth, for all the purposes for which science 
has demonstrated, or the public welfare shown, that these arti- 
cles of commerce can be safely and usefully employed. The 
provisions of this law permitting the manufacture of these 
liquors for exportation has been commented upon as incon- 
sistent with the principle upon which the law is founded. A 
moment's reflection will satisfy any fair-minded man that this 
criticism is unsupported by any just view of the subject. As 
has been shown, the law recognizes a great variety of uses to 
which spirituous liquors may be properly devoted. And it is 
no more a violation of the principle of the law, to allow these 
articles to be manufactured for exportation to other States or 
countries, where they may be used in the arts, than to permit 
them to be manufactured and sold for those purposes within 
this State. If after they reach a foreign jurisdiction, they 
should be employed for injurious rather than useful purposes, 
that is a matter entirely beyond the power or control of Massa- 
chusetts law — that must be regulated by the law of the place 
where the consumption of these articles takes place. Again, it 
is said this law trenches upon or invades the rights of the citizen. 
If by this is meant that the law forbids and restrains men from 
doing some things they might do were no such law in existence, 
then the charge is well founded. If it means more than this, 
then it affirms of this law only that which is true of every penal 
statute forbidding an act which, without the law, might be 
legal ; as, for instance, the law forbidding the sale of lottery 
tickets in this Commonwealth and many other similar statutes 
which might be named. But precisely the same charge can be 
made against the law which the petitioners ask the legislature 
to pass. For under the most liberal administration of that law 
not more than one man in a thousand will be able to obtain a 



40 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

license, and the petitioners ask that " the provisions of the 
existing statutes shall remain in force against all persons man- 
ufacturing or selling contrary to law, whether without license 
or in violation of their license." And more than this, by the 
terms of the proposed law each city and town is to have the 
power to determine whether or not to permit the sale of these 
" articles of commerce " within its own territorial limits. Now 
if it is an unauthorized assumption of power, and an unjust 
interference with the rights, either of the seller or buyer or 
both, for a majority of the people of the Commonwealth to 
declare by a single and direct act of their legislature, that 
intoxicating liquor shall not be sold in this State to be used as 
a beverage, how is it any the less so, for that same majority to 
establish the same prohibitory rule or law, by voting directly 
upon the question in the several municipalities of the Common- 
wealth, according to the provisions of the law proposed by the 
petitioners ? And if it is an act of oppression — an interference 
with private rights, for the majority to establish such a law for 
all the towns, it would be equally oppressive for majorities in 
half or one-quarter of the towns to establish it as a rule of action 
for all the citizens of such towns as should adopt the law. The 
objection we are now considering originates, as before stated, 
in a total misapprehension of the theory upon which this class 
of laws is founded — founded, as we affirm, on " that great con- 
servative police power which lies at the foundation of the 
prosperity of every State" 

Society and the State have the right to protect themselves 
against great and overwhelming evils ; and if to prevent these evils 
it becomes necessary to prohibit the sale of intoxicating bev- 
erages, the use of which is the known cause of such evils, even 
if the prohibition results in depriving the individual citizen of 
the power to a greater or less extent to buy and use those arti- 
cles, that is a deprivation to which it is his duty to submit, and 
he cannot call upon the State or the whole society to forego the 
execution of its great right of self-preservation or its duty " to 
prevent and redress crimes against individuals." 

Again it is urged, as if it were a valid objection against the 
law or system of laws we are now considering, that men can- 
not be made moral by an Act of the legislature. That is true, 
but then it is clearly within the legitimate scope and duty of 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 41 

legislation to guard against the corruption of morals. Men 
are not made rich by Act of Congress or Parliament, but it is 
within the acknowledged province of legislation, to prevent the 
causes of poverty, and to make it impossible or at least unlaw- 
ful for any class of citizens to pursue courses of trade or busi- 
ness, which cast heavy burdens of taxation upon the State, and 
to that extent impoverish and hinder honest industry in the 
acquisition of wealth. If men camiol^be_^a^e_.moxal.ajid. good 
by legislation, the legislature has at least the power and „ the 
right to forbid and punish a traffic which uniformly makes men 
criminal and vicious. And it is on this ground that the law 
forbids and punishes with heavy penalties, the sale of intoxi- 
cating liquors as beverages. It is not simply because alcohol 
is a poison, or that its use as a beverage is an immorality, that 
the traffic in it is forbidden for such purpose, but for the reason 
that that traffic, resulting in that use, produces a vast amount 
of crime, poverty, disease and general demoralization, followed 
by what would be otherwise unnecessary taxation to support the 
pauperism thus created, and to protect society from the 
disastrous consequences of crime thus occasioned. 

It is not from the employment of alcoholic liquors in the 
arts, but from their use as a beverage, that the evils complained 
of result ; and the difference between the existing law and the 
one asked for by these petitioners, is just the difference between 
good and evil, unless " the appalling statistics of intemperance," 
gathered from numberless sources and over the widest fields of 
observation, are altogether at fault. The law, as it now is, 
permits and authorizes the manufacture and sale of these 
liquors for all useful purposes ; the license law asked for would 
not only do this, but would legalize their sale for a purpose 
which, by an inevitable and uniform practice leads to the 
disastrous consequences which have been enumerated. 

That the common and intemperate use of these liquors is the 
fruitful source of crime and poverty, and consequent unjust 
taxation upon honest industry, cannot be doubted by any intel- 
ligent man who will bestow upon the question an impartial 
inquiry. We shall cite only a few of the many thousand wit- 
nesses that might be called to the stand upon this subject. 
The following are the declarations of some of the most 
intelligent and able judges of the English courts: — 
6 



42 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

Judge Coleridge : " There is scarcely a crime comes before me 
that is not, directly or indirectly, caused by strong drink." 

Judge Guerney : " Every crime has its origin, more or less, in 
drunkenness." 

Judge Patterson : "If it were not for this drinking you (the jury) 
and I would have nothing to do." 

Judge Alders on : " Drunkenness is the most fertile source of crime ; 
and if it could be removed the assizes of the country would be rendered 
mere nullities." 

Judge Wightman : " I find in my calendar that comes before me, 
one unfailing source, directly or indirectly, of the most of the crimes 
that are committed — intemperance." 

To this testimony of the English judges might be added that 
of the judges of every criminal court in America, and that of 
every public prosecuting officer. And no amount of decla- 
mation, no amount of ingenious speculation, can reverse the 
judgment of mankind, that intemperance, occasioned by the 
use of intoxicating liquors, is the great and abounding cause 
of a large share of all the crimes committed in every civilized 
country on the face of the globe. 

Our own Board of State Charities, in their annual report 
for the year 1866, speaking of the criminals who had been con- 
fined in the prisons of the Commonwealth during that year, use 
the following language : — 

" The nativity of 3,007 prisoners, or a little more than one-fourth 
was in Massachusetts, but the number whose parents were both Ameri- 
cans, was but 2,589, considerably less than one-fourth. Seven thousand 
three hundred and forty-three, or about two-thirds, are set down as 
intemperate, but this number is known to be too small. Probably mOre 
than eighty per cent, come within this class. Intemperance being 
the chief occasion of crime, as it is of Pauperism, and (in a less degree,) 
of insanity." 

Judge Sanger, called by the petitioners, and who, as judge 
and district-attorney, has been for many years familiar with the 
criminal courts of the Commonwealth, and especially in the 
county of Suffolk, was asked if he had any opinion whether the 
burden of taxation is increased by the present drinking usages ? 
To which he answered: — 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 43 

" I have no doubt it is largely." 

" How much would it be, in your opinion, in this Commonwealth ? " 
" I could not give the percentage. I think a large portion of the 
criminal costs of the Commonwealth are from that cause. There are 
very few cases into which the use of intoxicating liquors does not more or 
less enter." 

The Hon. Mr. Evans, a member of the executive council, 
made a most valuable statement before the Committee upon 
the subject now under consideration, of which the following is 
a summary : — 

For support of inmates of twenty institutions for town 

paupers and for prisons, annually, .... $1,500,000 00 
Ten per cent, upon cost of construction of twenty institu- 
tions, 236,072 00 

Ten per cent, upon valuation of town almshouses, . . 172,598 00 

Ten per cent, on costs of prisons and houses of correction, 150,000 00 
Five per cent, on costs of court houses, (allowing half 
the use to be for other purposes than those connected 

with the administration of criminal law,) . . . 45,000 00 

Private organized charities, 1,000,000 00 

Private unorganized charities, (estimated,) . . . 1,000,000 00 

Criminal costs above receipts or fines, . . • . 133,000 00 



Total, 



$4,237,000 00 



Compare these figures with the statement of the percentage 
of crime and pauperism occasioned by intemperance, and some 
idea can be formed of the annual costs to the Commonwealth of 
that traffic, which it is now seriously urged upon the legislature 
to legalize and license. And in view of these startling statistics, 
it is not strange that one of the most intelligent witnesses called 
by the petitioners, Ex-Governor Washburn, should feel com- 
pelled to admit, as he did in his elaborate statement to the 
Committee, " I do consider the selling of liquors under 
licenses to be a moral evil." And in another part of his tes- 
timony, he said, if " I could prohibit the sale of these liquors as a 
beverage I would," and " if I could enforce the present prohib- 
itory law I would ; " showing that he, one of the most distin- 
guished citizens and once the governor of the Commonwealth, 
and, at an earlier period, a judge in one of its courts, and now 



44 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

a professor and teacher of law in the leading university of the 
country, entertains none of those crude and half-formed opin- 
ions as to the rights of citizens and the powers and duties of 
government as would make it an unauthorized act on the part 
of government to prohibit the sale of intoxicating liquors. 

It is due to this witness to say, that he also expressed the 
opinion that it would be a less evil to license the sale rather 
than to suffer the traffic to go on as he understood it to be con- 
ducted at present. That is, the hope was expressed that the 
evil might be restrained and limited by licensing it. In other 
words, a vice or an evil is to be rendered less by throwing over 
it the protection and respectability which come from govern- 
mental sanction and authority. Herein lies the fallacy of the 
whole license system. For since it has been declared by an 
elder and higher law than any merely human enactment, that 
it shall never be lawful for individuals to do evil that good may 
come, it is impossible to see how an aggregation or society of 
men, acting under and through the forms of self-constituted 
government, can rightfully grant to any of their number licenses 
or indulgences for the doing of evil. It was not in the days of its 
greatest usefulness and purity, that a church, which has exer- 
cised a controlling influence over more than half the nations 
of Christendom, shocked and disgusted the moral sensibilities 
of mankind by the sale of its indulgences, but it was when it 
had reached the lowest depths of venality and depravity. 

But it is said by the petitioners that the existing statute can- 
not be enforced, and that, therefore, it should be repealed or 
modified. Upon this subject the testimony of one of their own 
witnesses, most competent to speak upon this point, ought to be 
conclusive against them. Judge Sanger, district-attorney for 
Suffolk County, and who as judge and prosecuting officer, has 
long been familiar with the administration of the criminal law 
in that county as well as in other counties of the State, testified 
before the Committee that this law can be enforced in Boston — 
that it is only a question of time. And certainly if it can be 
executed in Boston there will be no serious difficulty in its 
enforcement in every other part of the Commonwealth. Hon. 
E. B. Gillette, for many years district-attorney for the western 
district, called as a witness by the petitioners, testified that, 
with the right of challenge given to the government as it is now 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 45 

possessed by the defendant, this law can be enforced with all 
other penal statutes. And the testimony of the present efficient 
State constable and that of his predecessor in office, reinforced 
by what is known of their vigorous and effectual enforcement 
of this as well as other penal statutes, demonstrate the ground- 
lessness of this objection that the law cannot be executed. 

The following is the statement of Colonel William S. King, 
the first constable of the Commonwealth, upon this subject, and 
the testimony is all the more emphatic and valuable when it is 
known that Colonel King was not a particular friend of the 
prohibitory law. He says : — 

" When I entered upon the duties of the office (State constable,) to 
which, on my return from military service, I found myself appointed, I 
am free to confess that I did not feel hopeful of success in enforcing 
these laws. Without having given the subject much consideration, I 
had unconsciously been influenced by the common cry, l Oh, it is use- 
less to attempt to enforce these laws in opposition to public sentiment.' 
And what is called the prohibitory law I declined even to attempt to 
enforce. I had not been long in office, however, before I became con- 
vinced that the sufficient reason why the law had not been enforced was 
that no real effort had ever been made in that direction. And I now 
distinctly state that, in my judgment, by earnest, persevering, hopeful 
effort, with the requisite authority and means, not only this law, but any 
and every other law upon the statute book of Massachusetts, can be 
thoroughly enforced ; and if I had found it convenient to retain my 
position, with the means even then under my control, and with a final 
decision upon the legal questions in dispute, I would have staked my 
reputation with my fellow-citizens upon the result." 

All the legal questions referred to by Colonel King have been 
finally decided in favor of the law by the highest judicial tri- 
bunals of the State and of the United States. The State 
constabulary has been largely increased during the present 
session of the legislature, and all that is now wanting to com- 
plete the work of enforcing this, like every other penal statute, 
upon all known offenders, is an honest and faithful co-operation 
by the local police of towns and cities with the State police, as 
they are required to do by existing statutes. 

To admit for a single moment that the State cannot execute 
its laws would be a confession of weakness unworthy of a great 



46 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

and powerful Commonwealth, and would be a pusillanimous 
surrender of the authority of government to the power of the 
vicious and lawless. And to strike a law from the statute book 
on such a plea would deprive the remaining statutes of all dig- 
nity and of all moral force ; they would remain only as a 
monument of the weakness of government and the indulgence 
of the criminal classes, who should forbear to demand their 
repeal. 

It now remains for us to notice more particularly than we 
have heretofore done, though briefly, the two principal grounds 
on which the petitioners base their prayer for a license law. 

First, They claim that alcoholic beverages are a good and 
not an evil — that they are food, or act as a substitute for food — 
that when taken in moderation they sustain and nourish instead 
of impairing and destroying the animal economy. This, as one 
of the many debated and debatable questions of science and medi- 
cine, we do not propose here to discuss, but shall merely submit 
the latest, and as we believe, the most reliable conclusions 
of science upon this subject, as expressed by the most eminent 
chemists and physicians. 

1. That alcohol is not food ; being simply a stimulant of the 
nervous system, its use is hurtful to the body of a healthy man. 

2. That if its use be of service, it is so only to man in an 
abnormal condition. 

3. That ordinary social indulgence in alcoholic drinks, for 
society's sake, is medically speaking, a very unphysiological 
and prejudicial proceeding. 

4. That this use of fermented and distilled liquors is often 
noxious ; it should always be restrained ; it should never be 
tolerated except in exceptional cases. 

It is not denied that conclusions differing from the foregoing 
have been announced by other eminent scientific and medical 
authorities. But suppose we should admit, which however we 
are not prepared to do, that these conflicting authorities in 
science and medicine as to the dietetic character and value of 
alcoholic beverages, are so equally balanced that we are unable 
to determine on which side the truth lies, we are then thrown 
back upon the common and safer and more reliable sources of 
information to guide us in the discharge of our practical duties 
as legislators. And here we find the evidence overwhelming, 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 47 

and all leading inevitably to the same conclusions. So that if 
the dietetic value of these liquors were much greater than it 
is claimed to be, still, in view of the " appalling statistics of 
intemperance," it would be the duty of government to interfere 
and inhibit a traffic, which, unless all history is false, results 
invariably in consequences so disastrous to the peace, order, 
morals, health and highest prosperity of society. 

Second. Another ground on which it is claimed the prayer of 
the petitioners should be granted, is, that a license law would 
regulate and diminish the sale and use of alcoholic liquors. 
And this view of the subject is urged with so much earnestness 
and zeal, the legislature might, perhaps, be induced to try the 
experiment if it had not been tried a thousand times and for 
hundreds of years before, and invariably failed to accomplish 
the promised results. 

License laws to regulate the traffic in intoxicating liquors 
were in force in the Province and Commonwealth of Massachu- 
setts for more than two hundred years after the first settlement. 
And yet the history of that long period shows that the evil of 
intemperance continued and increased. New and more strin- 
gent and, perhaps, more judicious license laws were passed from 
time to time until the year 1787, when a new law was passed by 
the then recently formed State government. This law of 1787, 
with some amendments which did not change radically its gen- 
eral character, remained a law of the State until the year 1832. 
The frightful increase of intemperance during the quarter of a 
century which elapsed between the passage of the license law of 
1787 and the organization of the first society in the State for 
the express purpose of promoting temperance, would seem to 
furnish pretty conclusive evidence that the legalizing of the cause 
of intemperance is not the best or most effectual means of sup- 
pressing the evil. In the year 1816, a law was passed, for the 
first time in this State, and limited at first in operation to the 
city of Boston but afterwards extended to all parts of the Com- 
monwealth. This law authorized the granting of licenses to 
common victuallers, with the right to sell intoxicating liquors, 
as the petitioners ask that it may now be done. And contem- 
porary history will satisfy any honest student that that law was 
one of the most fruitful sources of crime and vice that ever 
existed in this Commonwealth. 



48 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

By an Act of the year 1832, county commissioners, as it was 
then understood, were required to license innholders and others 
to a certain extent, with the right to sell intoxicating liquors. 
And yet the rising flood of intemperance was not stayed. By a 
law of 1837, the county commissioners were at liberty to grant 
or withhold licenses as they might judge the public good 
required. And in six counties in the Commonwealth, they 
did refuse, for several years, to grant any licenses for the sale 
of intoxicating liquors as beverages. From that time, an 
opportunity was offered to the people of contrasting the benefits 
and evils of the two opposing theories of license and prohibition 
in adjoining counties ; and, in the course of a few years, and in 
the progress of events and the discussions and investigations 
which were carried on during these years touching these sub- 
jects, the whole Commonwealth came at length in 1852 to 
adopt the prohibitory theory, and have adhered' to it steadily 
from that time to the present. And we are not left to be 
guided by the light of our own experience alone upon this sub- 
ject; for, if we extend our observations to other and neighbor- 
ing States, and to other countries, we shall find the history of 
license laws, authorizing the traffic in intoxicating liquors, to 
be uniform, and shall be taught their utter inefficiency as refor- 
matory measures, or as restraining the unlawful traffic. Hon. 
Linus Child, one of the counsel who appeared before the Com- 
mittee for the petitioners, in the year 1838, being then a 
member of the legislature, and, as a member of one of the 
committees, discussing the effect of a license law uses this sig- 
nificant language : " It may well be doubted, whether intem- 
perance would have increased with more rapid strides, if no 
legislative regulation of the sale of intoxicating liquors had 
ever been made. " 

Nothing has occurred during the last thirty years, in the 
history or experience of States or communities where license laws 
have prevailed, to lead us to revise the judgment here expressed. 
And we may add, that the evidence adduced by the petitioners 
utterly failed to prove that temperance is to be promoted, intem- 
perance repressed, or the unlawful sale of intoxicating liquors 
prevented, by throwing over the traffic, in the hands of a few 
favored licensees, the direct sanction and protection of govern- 
ment. Moreover, it is difficult to understand how the practice 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 49 

of dram-drinking is mado less pernicious by making the sale of 
intoxicating liquors for that purpose lawful. But, why should 
we discuss these questions further which have been so long and 
so thoroughly settled in the minds of the people of this Com- 
monwealth ? For we quite agree with the committee of the 
Massachusetts legislature of the year eighteen hundred and 
sixty-one, in that part of their report wherein they say : " It 
may be taken to be the solemnly declared judgment of the 
people of the Commonwealth, that the principle of licensing 
the traffic in intoxicating drinks as a beverage, and thus giving 
legal sanction to that which is regarded in itself an evil, is no 
longer admissible in morals or in legislation. The license sys- 
tem, formerly in operation, was the source of insoluble embar- 
rassments among casuists, legislators, courts and juries. A 
return to it would re-open an agitation long since happily put 
to rest ; it would invade the moral convictions of great numbers 
of our people ; it would revive the opprobrium which public sen- 
timent always adjudges to a monopoly established by law, ren- 
dered all the more intense by the offensive nature of the business 
thus supported by the sanction and protection of the legislature." 

And the sound and forcible reasoning of a distinguished 
writer upon this subject has lost none of its force or value 
by the lapse of more than thirty years since he declared that 
" What ought not to be used as a beverage, ought not to be 
sold as such. What the good of the community requires us to 
expel, no man has a moral right to supply. That intemper- 
ance is dreadfully multiplied by the number of licensed shops 
for the retailing of spirits, we all know. And not only should 
the vending of spirits in these impure haunts be discouraged ; 
the vending of them by respectable men should be discouraged 
as a great public evil." 

Under the lead of such teachers of moral and social duty, 
the great debate, which commenced in this State more than 
fifty years ago, concerning the use and sale of intoxicating 
liquors, went on, accompanied by the most thorough investga- 
tion of facts, until it resulted in the enactment of the law now 
standing upon our statute book. And believing as we do, that 
neither public welfare nor private good, neither public rights 
nor private rights, require or could be promoted by any essential; 

7 



50 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

modification of that law at the present time, we respectfully 
report that the petitioners have leave to withdraw. 

The petition of the College of Pharmacy asks for such change 
in the law as will enable them to conduct their business in a 
legal manner. If druggists could not, under the present law, 
transact the legitimate and appropriate business of their profes- 
sion or trade, including the sale of spirituous liquors for medic- 
inal purposes, we should think it most reasonable that the law 
should be amended so as to enable them to do that business in 
" a legal manner.'* These petitioners do not ask to be permitted 
to sell the articles named for any other purposes than those 
now authorized by law. 

What then is there to hinder them from transacting their 
business in a legal manner now ? As has already been shown 
in this Report, every respectable apothecary in the Common- 
wealth can, under the existing law, be appointed an agent for 
the sale of spirituous or intoxicating liquors for all the pur- 
poses for which the petitioners say they desire to sell. And it 
is within the knowledge of the undersigned, that many of the 
apothecaries in the State, of the highest standing in their profes- 
sion, are acting as such agents, and have done so for many 
years. They are subjected to some additional trouble and 
labor in keeping a separate set of books in which they keep the 
account of their purchase and sale of these liquors. The pro- 
visions of law under which apothecaries may receive an appoint- 
ment as such agents, are perfectly well known to the petitioners ; 
and the reason they gave for not asking for such appointment, 
or being willing to accept it, was the inconvenience of conduct- 
ing the business in the manner required by law; and, rather 
than accommodate themselves to the requirements of law 
because it was inconvenient, some of their witnesses who were 
apothecaries, substantially admitted that they had carried on 
their business in violation of law. And perhaps it is not too 
much to say, that a large proportion of the apothecaries in 
Boston, as well as in other parts of the Commonwealth, who 
are not duly appointed agents for the sale of liquors, are now 
conducting that part of their business in defiance of law. There 
are, undoubtedly, many apothecaries to whom it would be per- 
fectly safe and proper to intrust the dispensing of liquors for 
medicinal and other lawful purposes, just as they now dispense 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 51 

other medicines. But, while this is true, it is equally well 
known that there is a very large number of persons engaged 
as druggists and apothecaries who, under cover of that business, 
are dealing extensively in the liquor traffic in utter disregard 
of law. 

Colonel King, in his report as constable of the Commonwealth 
in 1866, speaking of the apothecaries of Boston, says : " There 
are one hundred and seven apothecary shops open every Sun- 
day, employing two hundred and forty-nine persons. At many 
of these establishments liquor is freely sold, and Sunday is 
their best day." And he adds, that it is well understood that 
these establishments are dram-shops in disguise. 

And yet the keepers of these establishments are apothecaries, 
and a law authorizing apothecaries to sell intoxicating liquors 
would be, so far as this class of apothecaries is regarded, the 
worst and most dangerous form of a license law. And no fact 
is better known to the police and prosecuting officers through- 
out the Commonwealth, than that many of the apothecaries' 
shops in all parts of the State are of the character described by 
Colonel King. And while it is true that there are very many 
druggists and apothecaries of the highest reputation as men of 
business and general integrity, to whom the sale of liquors for 
all lawful purposes could be intrusted with perfect safety, yet 
such a law as the petitioners ask for, would open wide 
the door of license to all unworthy members of their pro- 
fession. And since under the provisions of existing laws, they 
can by securing appointments as agents, conduct their busi- 
ness successfully and in strict conformity with law, we cannot 
now join in a recommendation of any change in the law. It 
has been sometimes said that the liquors furnished by the State 
Commissioner, of whom all town and city agents are required 
to make purchases, are not always suitable for medicinal pur- 
poses ; and that that is a reason why apothecaries might not be 
willing to accept an agency. Whatever grounds there may have 
heretofore been for such complaints, it is believed that since the 
present Commissioner has been in office, no just cause for such 
complaints has existed and does not now exist. And the Com- 
missioner, Hon. Mr. Baker, testified before the Committee that 
he had applications from several apothecaries in the city of 
Boston for appointment as agents. But by the law as it now 



52 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

stands, he cannot appoint more than five such agents in the city 
of Boston. The section of the law giving the Commissioner this 
power, reads as follows : " He (the Commissioner) shall 
appoint in the city of Boston as many agents, not exceeding 
five, as he thinks the interests of the citizens require." If the 
mayor and aldermen would do their duty under the law in 
regard to appointing these agents, there would be no necessity 
of enlarging the powers of the Commissioner in the appoint- 
ment of agents. But it is in evidence that the mayor and 
aldermen of the city of Boston have, from year to year, almost, 
if not wholly, neglected this part of their duty ; notwithstanding 
the provisions of the law upon this subject are explicit and per- 
emptory. Section 17, of chapter 86, General Statutes, declares, 
that " the mayor and aldermen or selectmen of every city and 
town, on the first Monday of May annually, or as soon after as 
convenient, shall appoint for one year, unless sooner removed 
by the board appointing them, one or more suitable persons as 
agents of such place to purchase and sell, at some convenient 
places therein, spirituous or intoxicating liquors, to be used in 
the arts," &c. 

Under this section of the law the mayor and aldermen may 
appoint one or one hundred agents for the purposes named in 
the statute. And it is plain that there is nothing to hinder 
them from appointing every respectable apothecary in this city 
as such agents, if they adjudge the public interests and con- 
venience of the citizens require so many. But in view of the 
fact that the city authorities of Boston have not heretofore dis- 
charged their duty, and may not hereafter, under the section of 
the law cited above, we recommend the passage of the accom- 
panying Bill. 

CALEB SWAN, 

Of the Senate* 

P. EMORY ALDRICH, 
EDWARD FLINN, 
JOHN McCLELLAN, 

Of the House, 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 53 



Commorapealil) of Jtta00ad)UBdt0, 



In the Year One Thousand Eight Hundred and Sixty- 
Seven. 



AN ACT 



To amend section Ninth of chapter Eighty-Six of the 
General Statutes. 

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 
tives^ in General Court assembled, and by the authority of 
the same, as follows : — 

1 The commissioner named in the first section of 

2 chapter eighty-six of the General Statutes, shall have 

3 power to appoint in the city of Boston, under the 

4 direction of the governor and council, as many agents, 

5 not exceeding fifty, for the purchase and sale of 

6 spirituous and intoxicating liquors for the purposes 

7 set forth in the seventeenth section of said chapter, 

8 as he may think the interests of the citizens require, 

9 who shall have the same powers and be subject 

10 to the same obligations as agents appointed by the 

11 mayor and aldermen of cities, under the provisions 

12 of section seventeenth of the eighty-sixth chapter 

13 aforesaid. 



54 LICENSE LAW. [May, 



DISSENTING REPORT 

By Mr. Fay of the Senate. 



House op Representatives, May 14, 1867. 

The undersigned, a member of the "Joint Committee on the 
subject of a License Law," differing with his associates, both 
of the majority and minority, ventures to submit a separate 
Report. 

He commenced the consideration of the Petitions for, and 
Remonstrances against, the passage of a license law, entirely 
uncommitted. He had never been an advocate of the " pro- 
hibitory law ;" and by education and predilection has been 
inclined to trust rather to moral than to legal influences to 
forward the cause of temperance. 

Not having seen either of the other Reports, (though 
informed of their conclusions,) he may use illustrations or 
quotations identical with theirs, which he would otherwise 
have avoided, but he will endeavor to present the impressions 
left on his mind by the evidence submitted, and to add some 
thoughts of an earlier growth. 

Two Classes. 
He proposes to consider the petitioners and remonstrants as 
representing two classes of temperance men, both seeking what 
. they believe to be, on the whole, for the good of society. The 
fact that there are many whose interests or appetites lead them 
to support one side of this question, and whose judgment upon 
a matter of expediency may be thus affected, should not 
induce us to stigmatize all who do not favor prohibition, as 
" liquor-sellers " or " wine-bibbers." 

Petitioners. 
The petitioners ask for such a law as is " demanded by the 
best interests of the State, and will promote the cause of temper- 
ance." And the undersigned has known too long and too well 



1867.] house—No. 415. 55 

the personal influence and personal character of the petitioner 
first named, to believe that he would ask any legislation that 
did not seem to him best calculated to accomplish the objects* 
named in the petition ; and when he testified that he had 
been " pledged to total abstinence ever since he was old enough 
fo know what it meant," and had " never touched liquor as a 
beverage, and never allowed its use in his family," the previous 
estimate of his character was confirmed. 

And there are many other petitioners whose habits and 
example equally entitle them to be classed as friends of tem- 
perance. But we must admit, and the petitioners will confess, 
that many of their number, who are controlled neither by 
interest nor appetite, have not yet so far established an inde- 
pendence of the " customs of society,'' as not to allow its use in 
their families as a beverage. And yet they are temperate and 
virtuous men, and would not consciously mislead one of their 
fellows, nor throw their influence on the wrong side. 

Hon. Mr. Child, in his opening argument for the petitioners, 
says : " If the prohibitory law be the best, and will promote 
temperance the best, God grant, so far as I am concerned, that 
it be adopted. . . . Only give me the means that shall 
best make men temperate, moral, sober, religious." 

And again he says : "The question is, — which system of legis- 
lation (so far as it depends on legislation,) is best adapted to 
check, restrain and control the sale of liquor, and which is best 
fitted to promote the cause of temperance and best calculated 
to stay the ravages of intemperance ? " 

And again : " The great thing to be accomplished, if you 
would make men temperate and sober, is to induce a man intel- 
ligently, honestly, in view of truth, in view of fact, in view of 
argument, to give up the use of it." 

Therefore it seems unfair, and it is surely unwise, to repre- 
sent that none are friends of temperance who do not support 
the present law. 

Remonstrants. 

But, at the same time, it should be said that we find in the 

ranks of the remonstrants those who are known and recognized 

as especially the leaders in public temperance movements — 

men who have spoken most, worked most, paid most, for the 



36 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

promotion of the cause. They are earnest, self-sacrificing, 
conscientious, devoted men and women, and while we cannot 
approve the denunciatory spirit which is sometimes apparent, 
and while some of them are " extremists," and seem to be 
intemperate in their temperance, yet we must excuse much in 
view of their faithfulness to their own idea, and the magnitude 
of the evil which urges them on. We must not forget how, a 
few years ago, in the slavery agitation, we estimated men, 
leaders in that cause, and how we estimate them now. In 
getting our education on that subject, our school had a long 
term. We graduated after a four years' course of war, and find 
ourselves side by side with the men we formerly denounced as 
" fanatics." 

Therefore, while we may not agree with extremists now, we 
may, at least, be lenient in our judgment of them. They seem 
to be a necessary class in all reforms. 

The charge that some of the remonstrants vote one way and 
practice another is no valid argument against the law they 
advocate. As long as men are ambitious and votes will gratify 
their ambition, we must not expect the professions and practices 
of all politicians to be consistent. 

Difficulties. 

That the subject is " surrounded by difficulties " all will 
admit, for this attempt to restrain men by law is "fighting 
against an infirmity of our nature " — against the assumed right 
to eat, drink and wear what we please, and the desire to do, 
especially, what is forbidden. In this respect we are all 
children. 

But in determining our action we need not consider the mo- 
tives of the men who support either side of the question. The 
possible or probable practices under the law should alone claim 
the attention of legislators. Nor is it needful to determine 
whether or not it is a sin to sell or drink intoxicating liquors. 
There are sins quite prevalent in Massachusetts that we do not 
legislate against, and there are acts which are not sins that we 
do legislate against. 

Nor need we discuss what were the practices in Christ's time, 
or for what purpose he turned water into wine at the wedding; 
or whether the wine of those days was intoxicating, or whether 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 57 

Timothy was a willing or an unwilling listener to the suggestion 
for his " stomach's sake." We legislate for our time and for 
our people, and upon an article that we know to be intoxicat- 
ing ; and we need not quarrel as to the original meaning of the 
word translated " wine." 

Evils. 

The evils attendant upon the sale and use of intoxicating 
liquors are admitted on all hands. The most earnest advocates 
of a license law, those who prudently use, and those who abuse 
the practice, will agree upon this. To quote again from Mr. 
Child : " The basis of all legislation upon this subject rests 
upon the assumption that the common use of intoxicating 
liquors by the great masses of the people, will necessarily be 
followed by intemperance, and by all the evils of intemperance." 
If this were not conceded, the records of our courts, our pris- 
ons, and of pauperism would attest it. Wretched families and 
homes cry out to prove it ; and the waste of money and the 
waste of labor growing out of it is almost beyond conception. 

All these evils demand some effort, by every legislator and 
by every man, practically to lessen and control them. 

Suppression Impossible. 

But the undersigned starts upon the assumption, that it is 
impossible entirely to prevent by law the sale, use and abuse of 
spirituous liquors as a beverage. Ex-Governor Washburn has 
said, " It is idle to think of enforcing it (the prohibitory law,) 
in our large cities and towns, by means of the few civil officers 
known to the law. Against the passions, the appetites and the 
cupidity of the thousands who will be found active, busy and 
united in opposing it, these officers will be powerless." 

Under the present regime, this appears to be an extreme 
statement, but it recognizes a truth and a difficulty. 

Says Mr. Child: "No system of legislation, whether it be a 
license law or a prohibitory law, will check absolutely the prog- 
ress of intemperance by force of its own provisions, by its own 
inherent efficacy." 

More or less dissipation must be accepted as a sad necessity ; 
but we must not be wrecked upon the rock of impossibility. 
While it is apparent that the prohibitory law has not suppressed 

8 



58 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

the illegal sale of spirituous liquors in large communities, 
it did not appear in evidence that a license law in this or 
other States had ever been executed against the unlicensed, or 
that intemperance lessened under it. If it were desirable that 
the principle of a license law should be recognized, it has not 
yet appeared that one could be framed which would not be 
open to the same liability to abuse as the present law. There 
are many laws on the statute book not fully executed. They 
are enacted with such an expectation, and they are neither 
repealed nor amended. 

Experiment. 

All law is experiment, and the experiment of prohibition 
evidently commends itself to-day to a majority of the people of 
the State, a part of whom have an earnest faith in the principle, 
and a part consent to a faithful trial, in view of the existing 
evil. They contend, and it is fair to admit, that the experi- 
ment has not yet been fairly tried. They feel that the consti- 
tutional questions which have been carried to the Supreme 
Court of the United States have hindered the execution of the 
law. " A new law becomes practically inoperative until the 
legal principles are settled." Besides, the war has intervened. 
Now these hindrances are removed, and having the State con- 
stabulary, with an honored paternity and an efficient chief, 
with the machinery of the law perfected, there is a" fair field," 
and its friends will doubtless ask " no favor," if, in due time, 
the experiment shall have failed. Nor will the advocates of a 
license law persist in their opposition to the principle of prohi- 
bition, if the result shall prove that the evil is checked. 

It is contended, and it is true, that a law should be fully sus- 
tained by public sentiment. But, in this matter, at the present 
moment, it does not seem possible. Here are two large parties, 
with a radical difference as to the proper principle of legislation. 
There seems to be no middle ground, and a united public sen- 
timent will come only after thorough trial of one or the other 
of these laws. In the meantime we must not expect either 
party cordially to support the policy of the other, even as an 
experiment. 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 59 

As a Medicine. 
Although authorities differ as to the value or necessity of 
alcoholic liquors as medicine, most people believe that they are 
more or less useful. It is true that it is difficult to determine 
where their use as a medicine ends and as a beverage begins, 
as our appetites and our palates influence our sanitary necessi- 
ties. But while it is so generally used for medical purposes, it 
ought to be accessible at the places where other medicines are 
usually sold. The present law does not permit druggists and 
apothecaries, unless appointed town agents, to sell these articles. 
And the larger cities and towns would hardly appoint as many 
agents as there are apothecaries. To meet this need, and in 
answer to the petition of the Massachusetts College of Phar- 
macy, the undersigned recommends the passage of the accom- 
panying Bill, " To authorize druggists and apothecaries to sell 
spirituous liquors." 

u State Agency." 

Much discussion has taken place in regard to the character 
of the " State Agency," and the quality of the articles it fur- 
nishes. That the childhood of the agency did not give promise 
of an exemplary manhood, it is true ; but in the later days, no 
evidence exists of " need of conversion." The present incum- 
bent is admitted on all hands, to be above reproach, a man 
who strives to avoid all the evils of the system not inherent. 
Without discussing* the necessity or expediency of the system 
of a State Agency, it seems to the undersigned that while the 
Commonwealth proposes to continue it, the Commissioner 
should be placed on the same ground as other State agents ; 
that is, first, he should be furnished with the means to conduct 
his business ; and second, his salary should be a fixed one, not as 
now dependent upon a commission. The principle is a bad one, 
when applied to public officers, and ought not to be encouraged 
by the State. The same remarks will apply to the State Assayer, 
and his compensation should be definite. 

The undersigned recommends the passage of the accompa- 
nying Bill, " Concerning the State Liquor Commissioner and 
State Assayer." 



60 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

In Brief. 
By a hearing so protracted as this has been before your Com- 
mittee, and by the witnesses, unequalled in numbers and ability, 
there have been many points suggested, deserving comment. 
But passing most of these, it may be briefly said : — 

1. While " physiological chemistry is in its infancy, (Prof. 
White,) " a terra incognita" (Prof. Clarke,) we may well 
waive all discussion of the disputed question of " alimentation," 
and " disintegration of tissues," regretting, if to anyone it has 
seemed needful to prove alcohol essential to hinder " decay." 

2. From the customs in the grape-growing districts of 
Europe, if there be less intemperance, the wine must be more 
pure, (Prof. Agassiz,) the people more prudent, or the climate 
more propitious. When the vineyards of California, Ohio and 
Missouri, shall furnish pure wine enough to slake the public 
thirst, we may adapt our efforts, legal and moral, to that 
possible condition. 

3. We need not be too sensitive of " personal rights " in 
great emergencies. We often sacrifice them for the general 
good. All laws limit the liberty of the good citizen needlessly, 
if he alone were concerned. 

4. It would be creditable and profitable to Massachusetts, if 
her real estate owners would follow the example of Alpheus 
Hardy, (Appendix, page 203,) and " refuse to let any building 
for the sale of intoxicating liquors " as a beverage. 

No Present Change of PoLfbr. 
Failing to find sufficient evidence of the probable enforce- 
ment of a license law, and respecting the entire confidence of 
so many citizens in the prohibitory law, fairly tried, the under- 
signed cannot recommend any radical change in the policy of 
the State at the present time, and therefore consents to the 
report, " leave to withdraw," on the petitions of Alpheus Hardy 
and others. 

Moral Effort. 
" Law is not reformatory," but may be preventive till other 
measures can operate. The child is commanded till he is old 
enough to be reasoned with. 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. ' 61 

We may not successfully erect " legal fences against the 
devil," but we may invite the good angels in to pre-occupy the 
ground. Legislation may be confined to the " traffic," — the 
efforts of the pulpit and the individual to the " use." During 
all this discussion and experiment of law, moral effort should 
not be lessened. The advocates of whatever law, or for no 
law, are not exempt from this demand. 

Hence, what follows — 

A Deviation. 

Pending the trial of the legal experiment, and until public 
sentiment shall have fully declared itself, the undersigned car- 
ries out a previous suggestion, and ventures upon a departure 
from the strict line of legislative reports, and strays into a 
field outside of legislative action. 

His excuse must be found in the ardent desire which every 
man ought to have to make some contribution in this direction 
to the public good. 

It is the enunciation of a long cherished sentiment, and he 
is willing to subject himself to criticism for embracing the 
present opportunity of expressing it. 

Order of Good Exemplars. 

Waiving for the moment all discussion of the expediency of 
any present or proposed law, the undersigned ventures to indi- 
cate what has always seemed to him essential to final success 
in checking an evil which all recognize and deplore. 

He has long felt that, outside of all temperance movements, 
apart from orders of Good Templars, Sons of Temperance, 
Cold Water Armies, Total Abstinence Societies and State 
Alliances, there is an individual responsibility resting upon us 
all. Every man is an exemplar to some other man or woman 
or child, and every one is responsible for some kind of moral 
effort to lessen the unnecessary use of intoxicating liquors. 

This may be attained without the sacrifice of any individual 
right or privilege, except that of yielding to and following a 
prevalent but not essential form of hospitality. Without pro- 
fessing or consenting to be a total abstinent, and without setting 
up any claim to superior virtue, one may waive this privilege. 
While he retains all his right of self-control, it asks a man, for 



62 LICENSE LAW. [May, 

others' good, simply to surrender a social custom, and to become 
a self-elected member of an order which has neither grip nor 
pass-word, lodge-room nor regalia—the order of Good Exem- 
plars. 

Hospitality is said to be " as universal as the face of man," 
but there need be no arbitrary mode of expressing it. And 
the undersigned has always felt that the desired reform, to be 
vital and effective, must begin with the customs and example 
of those, who, by virtue of their position and character, control 
the fountain-head of public social influence. 

But while the men who endow our colleges, found our scien- 
tific schools and encourage our scientific men ; who fill our 
Galleries of Art and Public Libraries, and sustain our noble 
charities — while the overseers, trustees or officers of these insti- 
tutions — while the men who have been and are in public 
positions, and whom the people delight to honor — while the 
representative men of our Merchants, Manufacturers and Corn 
Exchanges— while those who can be independent in their action 
without being suspected of inability or parsimony or ignorance 
of custom — while these contend that true hospitality demands 
that they set wine before their guests, or accept it at the table of 
others — -just so long will those less prominent and influential, 
follow, as far as they are able, the customs of these more 
favored classes. 

If the danger were only to these, we might fear it less or not 
at all ; but those who imitate the manners of the leaders in 
social circles may fail to imitate their wise discretion. We 
claim to know our own strength ; it is not safe to presume upon 
that of others. Wine is a convenient expedient in hospitality, 
we know, but custom only makes it essential ; and our customs, 
as our fashions, are banished or established by the classes we 
have named. 

Forty years ago, the men of that time tell us, whether at 
wedding, birth or funeral, or at the call of the pastor or the 
friend, the inevitable decanter was set out ; and to the host or 
hostess there was as much mortification, if it were not full, as 
if they had not food enough for a generous meal. There is no 
such iron law now, and some one had to begin the breaking 
away from that universal custom. 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 63 

The undersigned believes that, with rare exceptions, it is not 
the natural love of wine or spirits which tempts men to drink, 
but that the habit grows out of social pleasures ; and he cannot 
resist the impression that the responsibility for some of the 
excesses in society is shared by those who endorse this example 
of " vinous hospitality ; " an example which others, weaker than 
they, cannot safely follow. He firmly believes that if a few of 
the leading, representative men and women of each community 
in Massachusetts, without combination, association or confer- 
ence, but each on his or her individual responsibility, would 
dare to be independent, and be willing to make such a personal 
sacrifice as has been suggested, it would be more productive of 
good results in coming time than all enactments, past or future. 

The men and women of this class would not fear to act 
because there are extremists on either side ; nor lest they might 
be counted as reformers or enthusiasts ; for without the press- 
ure of any law or obligation, their action would be quiet, silent 
even, simply adding one more to the individual sacrifices they 
are constantly making to the general good. 
■ Such an act would require no loss of liberty, and would 
result in little need of law. The aroma of this spirit of self- 
sacrifice, and this personal influence, more grateful and more 
enduring than the " boquet " of any wine, would penetrate 
where statute law can never enter, and would surely bear a 
double blessing. 

Conclusion. 

With an apology if his deviation from the usual line of legis- 
lative reports seems unbecoming, and with a hope that by public 
law or private example temperance may yet prevail, the under- 
signed commends the thoughts he has offered, and the Bills he 
presents, to the favor of the legislature. 

FRANK B. FAY, 

Of the Senate, 



64 LICENSE LAW. [May, 



• 



In the Year One Thousand Eight Hundred and Sixty- 
Seven. 



AN ACT 

To authorize Druggists and Apothecaries to sell Spirituous 

Liquors. 

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 
tives^ in General Court assembled^ and by the authority of 
the same, as follows :— 

1 Sect. 1. Druggists and apothecaries may sell 

2 alcohol, spirits and wines for medicinal purposes only : 
3' provided, that they shall keep a book in which they 

4 shall enter the date and quantity of every sale, the 

5 name and residence of the purchaser, and if exported, 

6 the place to which exported and the name of the con- 

7 signee ; which book shall at all times be open to the 

8 inspection of the mayor and aldermen or selectmen, 

9 or of any state constable. 

10 If a druggist or apothecary, or any clerk or agent 

11 of a druggist or apothecary is convicted of an illegal 

12 sale, he shall be subject to the penalties prescribed 



1867.] house-No. 415. 65 

13 in section thirty of chapter eighty-six of the General 

14 Statutes. 

1 Sect. 2. Section twenty-six of chapter eighty-six 

2 of the General Statutes is hereby repealed. 

1 Sect. 3. This act shall take effect upon its 

2 passage. 



66 LICENSE LAW. [May, 



tfomrnoraoealtl) of JHaBsacfjusetts* 



In the Year One Thousand Eight Hundred and Sixty- 
Seven. 



AN ACT 



Concerning the State Liquor Commissioner, and State 

Assayer. 

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 
tives, in General Court assembled, and by the authority of 
the same, as follows: — 

1 Sect. 1. From and after the first day of July 

2 next, the state liquor commissioner shall receive as 

3 compensation for his services, in lieu of the commis- 

4 sion provided for in section three of chapter eighty- 

5 six of General Statutes, and chapter one hundred 

6 and thirty-six, acts of eighteen hundred and sixty-one, 

7 the sum of four thousand dollars per annum, pay- 

8 able from the treasury of the Commonwealth. 

1 Sect. 2. To enable said commissioner to carry 

2 out the purposes of his office and complete the pur- 

3 chases authorized by said chapter eighty-six, the 

4 treasurer and receiver-general is hereby authorized to 

5 furnish to said commissioner, from time to time, such 



1867.] HOUSE— No. 415. 67 

6 sums of money as he may require : provided, the 

7 whole amount of such advances shall not exceed 

8 fifty thousand dollars. Such payments shall be 

9 approved by the governor and council, and be subject 
10 to such regulations as may be established by them. 

1 Sect. 3. Said commissioner shall, on the first day 

2 of each month, make return to the auditor of all his 

3 purchases and sales, and of the expenses of his office, 

4 for the month next preceding ; and shall annually 

5 make a report of the total amount of such purchases, 

6 sales and expenses, with the amount of stock on 

7 hand and its value. 

1 Sect. 4. He shall at all times keep his stock 

2 fully insured for the benefit of the Commonwealth. 

1 Sect. 5. The state assayer employed under section 

2 three of chapter eighty-six of General Statutes, 

3 shall receive from the first of July next, in lieu of the 

4 commission named in said section, such fixed salary 

5 for his services, and such an amount for the expenses 

6 of his office, as the governor and council may deter- 

7 mine. 

1 Sect. 6. The treasurer and receiver-general is 

2 hereby authorized to borrow on the credit of the 

3 Commonwealth such sums as may from time to time 

4 be necessary to carry out the conditions of this act. 

1 Sect. 7. All acts and parts of acts inconsistent 

2 with this act are hereby repealed. 



68 LICENSE LAW. [May, 



DISSENTING REPORT 

By Mr. Sherman of the House. 



House of Representatives, May 14, 1867. 

In most of the smaller towns of the State, the present law, or 
the license law in connection therewith, will suppress the sale of 
liquor. The question, in fact, relates only to the cities and 
large towns, where the present law has as yet had no real 
success. 

It is claimed that hereafter, the law, fortified by the United 
States court decisions, and its execution made possible by the 
increase of the State constabulary force, and the change of the 
jury law, will be effectual everywhere in the State. 

If a license law is passed this year, it will ever afterwards be 
claimed that it was passed just when the prohibitory law was 
about to become effectual, and because it was becoming effec- 
tual. It is due to the friends of the present law that it shall 
have the trial of another year. 

If the experience of another year should prove the present 
law a success, no friend of total abstinence can, with reason, 
ask for a license law ; and then it will remain to be seen 
whether public sentiment will sustain prohibition enforced, as 
well as prohibition in theory only. 

If, however, it is not successful, and successful not merely by 
fitful efforts, attended with no permanent effect, not by merely 
closing particular places of sale, but by stopping the sale, and 
the drinking ; if it shall be found still to work the manifest 
injustice of seizing the liquors of certain individuals and closing 
up certain places of sale, while other places of larger traffic are 
not interfered with, but with special favoritism are allowed to 
continue to sell, with great increase of business — then the 
present law ought to be regarded a failure, and a license law r , 



1867,] HOUSE— No. 415. 69 

like that proposed in the Majority Report, meet with general 
favor. 

Next year it cannot be claimed that the prohibitory law has 
not had a full and fair trial, with all the adjuncts needed for its 
efficacy. If it fails of success, the license law will, as I think, 
receive the support of a large part of the friends of temperance 
and of consistency in legislation. 

I recommend that the petitions be referred to the next 
legislature. 

E. P. SHERMAN. 



Jppen&k 



TESTIMONY. 



BY 

JAY READ PEMBER, AND ASSISTANTS. 



APPENDIX. 



FIEST DAY. 

Tuesday, Feb. 19, 1867. 

The Committee met at 10 o'clock, A. M. There appeared, on behalf of 
the petitioners, Hon. John A. Andrew and Hon. Linus Child, and on 
behalf of the remonstrants, W. B. Spooner, Esq., and Rev. A. A. Miner. 
The Chairman read the order adopted by the Committee regarding the intro- 
duction of testimony. 

The opening statement on behalf of the petitioners was submitted by Hon. 
Linus Child. 

Testimony of Ex-Goy. Emory Washburn. 

Question. (By Mr. Child.) Mr. Washburn, will you be good enough 
to state your means of judging as to the operation of the two systems of law 
relative to the sale of liquor — the old license system, and the prohibitory 
system now in operation ? Give your means of ascertaining as a judge of 
the courts, as a lawyer, etc. You can go on without questions, if you please. 

Answer. I received a notice from my friend, Mr. Morissey, last night, to 
attend here this morning, but I did not know for what purpose I should be 
called ; and there being a hearing upon the subject of a license law, I sup- 
posed some questions in reference to that might be asked me, and I took the 
liberty to jot down some instances which have fallen within my own observa- 
tion during my former experience ; and, without reading them, I simply ask 
the liberty to refer to some data upon which any opinions that I may be 
called upon to express are founded. If the question is simply a question of 
fact, of course my remarks must be exceedingly limited. If I am at liberty 
to state my own observation from some experience that I have had in the 
matter of the temperance movement at an earlier period, I should ask per- 
mission to say that I engaged in that as early as 1828, and from 1828 to 1852, 
I suppose that probably I was as active, I do not say as efficient, but prob- 
ably as active, as any man. I know scarcely a town in the county of Wor- 
cester where I have not had occasion to go more than once while engaged in 
speaking upon this subject. I certainly must have paid out in horse-hire 
several hundreds of dollars, in addition to the time I have spent besides. I 
always held myself at the service of any one who wished to oppose the grant- 
ing of licenses ; and I suppose I must have resisted more than one hundred in 
the county, and generally with success ; and I never, from the beginning of 
my labors to the present time, have received the first cent for compensation* 
I never allowed myself to receive compensation. I began with a pretty 
earnest and confident zeal and belief that intemperance could be suppressed 
by stopping the sale. It was my conviction that it was unnecessary, and that 
it could be stopped ; and to that point, of course, I labored, so far as my 



APPENDIX. 3 

ability -went. But I soon found that unless we could bring public sentiment 
up to a proper tone, — educate it, if I may so speak, to a proper tone of feeling, 
— that we could not succeed in suppressing the sale. It was so universal at 
that time, (and my friends here will remember the condition of things, as far 
as temperance was concerned, at that time.) that I suppose there was not a 
family that did not use it. I suppose that you could not go to a merry- 
making, or to a grave, serious meeting, that you did not find liquor freely 
offered and used. There was in the town in which I lived, I think, some 
five or six persons licensed as retailers, and as many inn-keepers, who sold it. 
That was in the town of Leicester. We went to work, those of us who took 
part in it, with the view of changing the moral opinion of the community, and 
to satisfy the people that it was not only unnecessary, but that it was a moral 
and plrysical evil, and one which the community were called upon, out of 
regard to their own best interests, to suppress. I believe that the gentlemen 
engaged in that cause had succeeded, to a very considerable extent, in that 
and other counties, in satisfying the public mind. The chief methods of 
operation were through the public press, through public meetings, through 
addresses to the public, by pamphlets and by conventions. I do not know 
how many conventions I had the honor of being present at. Certainly I was 
secretary of the first one ever held in Worcester County, and I had the honor 
of being the vice-president of the first young men's temperance association 
held in that county, and that, you must consider, was some time ago ; and I 
believe there were few that were more eager and earnest debaters of that 
matter than I endeavored to be in these conventions. The result, Mr. Chair- 
man, was, that the public feeling and the public sentiment grew in the com- 
munity ; and it was so strong afterwards at Worcester that there was scarcely 
a man among the leading men there that did not come into our conventions 
and join with us and take part in the measures which we adopted for the 
suppression of intemperance. We had a serious contest, I remember, for 
instance, on the subject of granting licenses ; and it was earned so far that 
our tavern-keepers shut up their hotels, with the exception of one who kept a 
temperance house. We carried it through there and sustained it. Public 
sentiment had grown, and the public began to feel, as it seemed to me, as if it 
was their cause, and not the cause of any set of officers ; that it was the cause 
of the public, and that they were to take care of it ; and it was to this that 
we had appealed. Things went on in that way, Mr. Chairman, until 1838. 
In 1838 I had the honor of being a member of the House of Representatives, 
where the question of the sale of liquors came up, and we carried through, 
with a very decided vote, what was called the " fifteen-gallon law." It was 
in consequence of what was supposed to be then the public sentiment by the 
large number of petitioners for such a law. The number I do not recollect, 
but I think it was some twenty thousand. It was a very large number at any 
rate. We supposed that public sentiment was to sustain such a law as that. 
That law prohibited the sale of liquor in less quantities than fifteen gallons, 
and there were measures taken after that had been passed to carry out that 
law. I remember of taking a very active part the year following in getting 
up, in connection with my friends, a public celebration on the 4th of July, 
and a celebration the purpose of which was to sustain the public sentiment in 



4 APPENDIX. 

upholding that " fifteen-gallon law," as it was called. Affairs went on in that 
way for a year or two after that law was reported. It was ascertained that 
public sentiment was not up to sustaining that law. Instead of being backed 
up, as we supposed it was going to be, it failed almost entirely, and it was 
repealed. I may be permitted perhaps to make the remark here, without 
meaning to violate the suggestion of the chairman in relation to the matter 
of testimony, that the difficulty that we found (certainly that I found myselt 
in my own experience,) was this: that we undertook to make the sale and the 
use of liquor criminal, to punish it as criminal, and to attach a penalty to it. 
Most things of a properly criminal character can be suppressed, that is to say, 
can be prohibited altogether ; for instance, larceny, under all circumstances, 
is criminal, and so a great variety of these acts are crimes under all circum- 
stances. But we were never able to devise a law which would be sustained 
by the public sentiment, except one for regulation. We recognized in every 
Act (and as is recognized in the present Act I believe) the right under some 
circumstances to sell liquor. I believe no Act has ever gone so far (if it has, 
it has escaped my knowledge,) as to undertake to stop the sale of liquor alto- 
gether, as you do other crimes. You have got to regulate it ; but the diffi- 
culty we had to encounter was to make a public sentiment that it was under 
certain circumstances a crime ; that what was under certain circumstances 
right and necessary in the eye of the law and in the eye of the community* 
was, under other circumstances, so far penal as to be a crime. That was one 
great trouble that we had to encounter. That was the difficulty we had in 
carrying out the " fifteen-gallon law." Complaints were made that if it was 
right to buy sixteen gallons at one time, it was right to buy it at four different 
times. That is one difficulty we had to encounter in making an entirely pro- 
hibitory law. We found that the sale, as I said before, was to be regulated, 
instead of being absolutely and unqualifiedly prohibited and restrained. 
Now another thing, Mr. Chairman, which we found, (I say we because it 
was common conversation among those of us who were actively engaged at 
that time, and it was what I encountered everywhere when I made addresses 
and when I went into the different towns,) was the great difficulty which we 
had to encounter in this fact : that every people in the world has had and 
probably always will have artificial stimulants — something that supplies 
excitement, (whether it is called for by nature I do not know : I speak of it 
merely as a universal fact,) and I believe every nation has the means of 
supplying artificial stimulant, under circumstances which produce not an 
intoxicating but a stimulating effect ; as, for instance, tea, coffee, wine, or the 
grosser forms of alcoholic drinks. We found that we had got to encounter 
that everywhere. When I went to appeal to a man to leave off his drinking, 
where he was ruining himself and family, he would say, " My neighbor uses 
it ; why do not you go to him. It is no worse for me than it is for you to 
use your tea and coffee." I do not mean to say that the argument was a 
good one. I merely speak of the facts as presented to us, and it seemed 
hopeless to attempt to suppress and defeat the sale of liquor entirely. We 
had, therefore, this to encounter : that in the case of the arts and in the case 
of medicine, alcohol, in some form, was regarded as necessary and useful, 
and that, in the matter of pleasurable excitement, (if I may use that term, 



APPENDIX. 5 

and I use it as mildly as I can,) every class of people and every nation had 
had something that answered for that purpose, and which had grown by 
usage to be indulged in in the grosser forms of drinking. Now, sir, our 
zeal, (I say our — I would not hold my friends responsible for that zeal — I 
will say my zeal,) carried some of us at least to attempt to confine and stop 
that. Cider was forbidden ; beer was forbidden ; everything of a stimulating 
character was forbidden. And they have had their due degree of severity 
of remark whenever I have had an opportunity to talk about them. And I 
wish now to say that I do not come here to-day to do that which shall throw 
anything in the way of the progress of the temperance movement. I would 
let my right hand be cut off this moment rather than to throw any obstacle in 
the way of it. And if this law should be carried out, (though I have not indi- 
vidually co-operated with my friends in this movement,) I would go the 
whole length of the matter. I do not want any indulgence or anything in 
the way of favor in that respect. Liquor I do not use. With perhaps the 
exception that on one occasion, when through accident I came near sustain- 
ing a very serious injury, when the doctor prescribed for me the use of some 
brandy, I do not think I have used a glass of liquor for the last thirty years, 
and I have never changed my views in this matter ; and the question that I 
am now dealing with is a question of policy. If I am wrong in policy, I am 
sorry for it. I have been asked by my friend, Mr. Child, to state what my 
views are, and that is a point upon which I wish to say a word. Now, then, 
I became satisfied that, so far as concerns this matter, the policy to be 
adopted was one of regulation. I do not see how you could in the nature 
of things make it a policy of prohibition. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooler.) Don't you call the present law one of regu- 
lation ? 

A. I do, sir; but I think there is a great objection to it; and before I get 
through I will state what I mean by regulation. I start with the principle, 
that it is a question of policy as to how to treat the subject legally. That is 
the whole question, as it seems to me. I am not going to argue the question, 
but that is the view to which I have come, that it is impossible, wholly, to 
suppress the sale of intoxicating liquors. Now, gentlemen, as I said before, 
the only way in which this can be done as it seems to me, is by means of a 
public sentiment, and a power of public opinion. I do not believe, from a 
pretty long course of observation and experience, that you can make a law 
which is decidedly against the public sentiment, and carry it out, any more 
than you could make a black man white, or a white man black. You cannot 
do it. And there are statutes upon our statute-books to-dav that are violated 
every day. No man thinks of complying with them, and they are mere dead 
letters. Therefore, it is my belief that you cannot carry them out without 
having a public sentiment to sustain you. My friend did not allude, so far as 
I heard, in giving the history and course of policy here, to the measure which 
was attempted in 1840 to bring temperance into the matter of politics. 

Mr. Hildreth, either himself or through his instrumentality, got up a 
convention (the largest, by all means, that I have ever attended in Boston,) 
for the purpose of organizing a temperance political party. I had the honor 
of being a member of that convention, and I had the honor of being one 



6 APPENDIX. 

among seventy of that convention (among whom were Mr. Hoar and several 
other distinguished gentlemen,) who battled that point all day ; but we were 
voted down by a very large majority. There was a sentiment in that con- 
vention in favor of getting up a temperance party. We entered our solemn 
protest against it, and for some reason or other the project was never carried 
out. My reason was this : that the moment you bring it into a party, the 
desire for office is created, and the very man that clamors the loudest is 
generally likely to be the man that does the least for the cause of temperance ; 
and it is a fact in my own experience, that the men who have scoffed at me 
and hooted at me and my friends in the advocacy of this matter, were 
the men who, in the end, stepped forward as patrons and leaders in the 
temperance movement. The result of the movement was, that there was no 
further action taken ; but as an evidence that our effort was not entirely 
without effect, I may mention here, that I had the honor to be placed at the 
head of seventy others, against whom a most bitter and vindictive pamphlet 
was published, and that this number of gentlemen was composed of tempe- 
rance men who were opposed to creating a temperance party, to be composed 
of temperance men. Now, I come down to the matter of law after these 
preliminaries. The law of 1832, as you are aware, (if I recollect it aright, 
for I have not looked at my law-books for a great while ; my friend, the chair- 
man, has looked over his law-books more recently as to that matter,) contem- 
plated the granting of licenses by commissioners, upon application of selectmen 
of the various towns ; so that no man could get a license unless he had the 
approbation of the selectmen and also the approbation of the county commis- 
sioners. The election of the county commissioners was based upon the popular 
vote, and of course the selectmen were chosen by the town. Therefore, 
whether men should be licensed or not, or whether you should have a licensed 
store in any village or town, depended upon the popular vote of that region. 
That, sir, was the means by which we then went to work with all the earnest- 
ness in our power to counteract the effect of the free and general sale and 
use of liquors. I might mention to you that I had occasion a great many 
times to resist the licensing of public houses and of retail dealers. 

The question became a question of discussion in every town, in every town 
meeting, and in every village circle, and the result was, that we got a fair 
discussion upon the question of temperance, and there were no two sides 
about it; and whenever the question has been brought fairly before the 
people, this has always been the result ; and if we did not succeed in this or 
that town in one instance, we were sure that it would be made right the next 
year, by getting a proper kind of selectmen. In the county of Worcester 
we got so that we chose temperance men for commissioners, and they would 
not grant licenses oftentimes, even if they got the approbation of the select- 
men ; and I have some reports here, in which some statements are made 
bearing upon this point, and which would be entirely according to my own 
recollection. It is stated that, in 1830, in the county of Worcester, there 
were 211 licensed retailers, and 160 inn-holders; making in all, 371. In 
1840, there were 69 licensed retailers, and 105 inn-holders having licenses. 
Now, it was about that time that efforts were particularly directed to this 
matter, and they continued up to 1852. In 1850, the retailers licensed were 



APPENDIX. 7 

36 ; and it was a fact within my own knowledge, that, in some of the towns, 
the very towns which I mentioned, where before 1828 there was such a num- 
ber of licensed retailers and as many inn-holders, I do not believe — and it 
is a belief founded upon very thorough inquiry — that there was a place 
where you could buy a glass of liquor for any consideration, in the way of 
sales. It was in many towns practically and actually expelled, and the thing 
was going on with entire success in town after town in that county ; and I am 
speaking of that county now more particularly. We had been banishing it 
by public sentiment, by the action of the public mind, until it was expelled 
from a great many of the towns ; and in the town of Worcester it was carried 
so far, that the hotel-keepers, thinking to produce a counter current, took 
down their signs ; and those of us who had houses took in strangers the best 
way we could ; but the whole sentiment of the people was in favor of this 
measure. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Did the hotel-keepers bring about a granting of 
licenses in that way ; did they get any legal authority to sell ? 

A. I do not remember how that was ; I could not speak confidently as to 
the result of their action. I remember the fact very well, for it was an event 
not to be forgotten. I am alluding to this, Mr. Chairman, simply to show the 
course of public sentiment, and the power of the movement in favor of 
temperance, and its results. Another thing, Mr. Chairman, is in regard to 
the law of 1832, taken as a subject of judicial investigation. I suppose there 
were more questions of law growing out of that law of 1832, than there ever 
have been in any other laws of this nature, unless it was under the Maine Law. 
Almost every word, and certainly every passage of that bill was subjected to 
judicial investigation ; and after having gone through our courts in every 
form, the question of the constitutionality of the law came before the United 
States Court, and it was decided that the law was constitutional. The law had 
become settled so that there could be no mistake. The constitutionality of the 
law had been established, so that there was nothing further about that, and we 
thought we were going on swimmingly, so that we should, by and by, arrive at 
that point where there would be no improper sales. We had hoped to prevent 
the excess in the use of liquor, and the use of it in the family, and the use of 
it by the young, and the use of it on social occasions, so that no man would 
acquire those habits which make him a slave in his old age ; and we supposed 
we were going on successfully. And the great point of our success was this, 
— and the great objection to the position of my friends on the other side, 
which I make on the ground of law, is this, — that in carrying out this law we 
found a divided enemy ; each man fought upon his own ground — a man in 
Paxton could get a license, and a man in Holden or Stirling could not. Each 
depended upon his own action. There was no combination between the 
liquor-dealers.- The policy of divide and conquer was being carried out 
most successfully ; and we had nobody to encounter but some fellow who 
stood alone in his determination to sell rum. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How was it in Boston at that time ? 

A. I cannot say; I am speaking in reference to Worcester County, and I 
wish it to be distinctly understood that what I am showing is in reference to 
that county exclusively. The result was, that when a man attempted to sell 



8 APPENDIX. 

liquor, his neighbors took it up, and they stopped his business. That was the 
result in town after town, because there was no combination, and there was 
no opportunity to combine. If you combined in two or three towns, it would 
not prevent the selectmen in another town ; so that there was no object in 
combining. And the result was that we carried this measure (and when I 
say we, I mean the friends of temperance) ; we carried it in detail, point 
after point, individual after individual, until, in a very large portion of the 
towns of Worcester County, we had substantially prevented its being 
licensed, and where it was licensed, the people took it in their own hands 
and drove it out. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Drove it out by law ? 

A. Drove it out by public sentiment. 

Q. Did not the people tell them that they would prosecute them if they 
did not stop the sale ? 

A. They did prosecute them, time and again. 

Q. Was not that the means employed by moral sentiment ? 

A. Yes, sir ; and without that moral sentiment the law would never have 
been of use, any more than a blank writ in the hands of a sheriff. I have 
been absent from that county for ten years. I have not been through 
the county, making temperance speeches, since 1852, and have not had 
occasion to inquire as to the more recent condition of affairs there. I 
would say that in my own native town of Leicester, complaints were formerly 
made of places where liquor could be obtained. Soon after I left Leicester, 
I believe there was not a place where you could have got anything to drink. 
In regard to Worcester, I know nothing about the places for selling. I know 
that a friend of mine met an acquaintance of his from New Orleans in the 
street, and his friend says to him, " Come, let's go and have something to 
drink." But my friend says to him, " You cannot get anything to drink 
here, the places for the sale of liquor have all been closed up." And his 
friend replied, " Why, yes, you can ; I have been to more than twenty places 
here in this city." And he had not been in the place two days. Now I do 
not know that this was so ; I merely speak of what I have heard stated upon 
that point. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) When was that ? 

A. It was about the time I came from there, about ten years ago ; it was 
long enough after the Maine Law was in force. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Was the law enforced ? 

A. No ; because if it had been, you could not have got the liquor; that 
is to say, if it was so ; I cannot say that liquor was sold. And this, gentle- 
men, was the way we were enabled to operate. We were going on in this 
successful manner. Every year we had temperance conventions, and many 
of the best temperance men in Massachusetts took part in them, and there 
was entire harmony of action about it, when the measure of 1852 was 
proposed and carried through. Now, sir, if I may be permitted to make it 
so far a personal affair as to make an explanation of my views, and to show 
how far they have been carried out, I received, on the 18th of June, 1852, 
from Rev. Mr. Otheman, a request to join a temperance convention, to be 
held for the purpose of taking measures to carry out the law which had then 



APPENDIX. 9 

been just passed. Without reading the letter, I may be permitted, perhaps, 
to read the letter which I sent in reply ; and I was threatened with the 
publication of this letter at a time when it would have been of some value to 
those who were opposed to this matter. I say as follows, viz : — 

" Dear Sir, — I am deeply sensible of the honor you do me by asking me 
to meet some of the friends of temperance, in view of the proposed convention 
in this place. 

" A sense of self-respect, as well as of respect for those who have suggested 
a wish that I should confer with them, requires me to state as briefly as I can 
why I shall beg to be excused from the conference. 

" I understand the object of such a conference at this time has reference 
mainly to the law recently enacted by our legislature, and the means by 
which it can be sustained. Now it has been my misfortune to differ from 
many of the friends of temperance, as to the expediency of such a law at 
this time ; and as the reasons for such an opinion are satisfactory to my own 
mind, I could not meet those gentlemen and openly express my sentiments 
without seeming to them to be opposed to the success of the cause itself, and 
placing me in a false position. 

" While, therefore, I have not confidence enough of success in enforcing the 
law effectually in this Commonwealth, to take active measures for its support 
for some time yet to come, I am unwilling to appear to be opposed to the ends 
which its friends have at heart, and therefore stand aloof from the discussion 
that is going on upon one side and the other. 

" And permit me very briefly to state some of the grounds of my distrust 
of the expediency of such a law at this time. Everybody admits that it is 
idle to attempt to enforce a law for any length of time against the current of 
public sentiment. The friends of this law believe public sentiment is strongly 
with them, and so strongly that such a law is not only demanded, but will be 
sustained. I hope they are right ; but, to my mind, the fact is not so ; the 
evidence does not satisfy me that they are warranted in their conclusion. I 
remember the law of 1838, in the enactment of which I took an humble part, 
and I cannot forget how we were deceived by the professions of petitioners 
and the power of mere names. 

" I know with how much difficulty the law as it was left after the repeal of 
the Act of 1838, was enforced; how much legal ingenuity was expended to 
settle before our judicial tribunals the construction of almost every clause 
and expression in the statute ; how long it was before the officers of the law 
could feel any certainty that an entire panel of jurors would sustain the law, 
however strong the proof of facts might be ; and, I think, I have a right to 
add, how much obloquy and abuse, in some quarters, were heaped upon the 
judges of our courts, who fearlessly did their duty in administering the law. 
And I know, too, how comparatively recently these obstacles have been over- 
come, and it seemed to me unwise, inexpedient, and I feared almost suicidal 
to step at once from a platform, which had become so well established, upon a 
new one that can at best be but problematical for a considerable time yet. I 
thought if a defect as to mode of proof, which really did exist under the old 
law, had been supplied, — and it could easily have been done, — the cause of 
temperance would have been safer than it can be under any new system of 
legislative restriction. It was a law to which the people had become accus- 
tomed, which they had understood could and would be enforced, and no new 
issues could be raised under it. 

" On the other hand, the present law, so far as it is new, is an experiment, 
and one which in order to its success requires the people as a body to come up 
to its aid. It is idle to think of enforcing it in our larger cities and towns by 
means only of the few civil officers known to the law ; against the passions, 
the appetite, and cupidity of the thousands who will be found active, busy, 
and united in opposing it, these officers will be powerless. And if, as we 

2 



10 APPENDIX. 

have every reason to fear, this is to be brought In as an element of political 
action, my fear is the law will find the fate of that of 1838, and we shall have 
to go back and begin the fight anew. 

These are some of the reasons that have influenced my judgment. I hope, 
or I should say, I wish that I may find myself mistaken. I could not sepa- 
rate from friends, with whom I have so cordially co-operated heretofore, with- 
out a frank expression of my views, that they may see that, although I may 
differ upon the question of measures, I am, as I have ever been, with them in 
the advocacy of the great principles for which they are so manfully 
struggling." 

Now, sir, those were the views that I presented to my friends at that time, 
and from that time I have never had any occasion, and I have never gone 
forward with those gentlemen in the attempt to sustain the provisions of that 
Act. I do not believe now that it can be carried out, though I speak more 
from opinion in this matter, than from my own direct observation. Now, sir, 
we lost by means of that law the entire moral power of the community. It 
was understood by the community previously that the law was for the people 
to carry through of themselves; that it was a cause for them to enforce 
instead of being placed in the hands of a few constables. Every man felt 
that it was a serious sacrifice. I know that my friends will justify me in say- 
ing this. If you threw off the responsibility on a set of officers, it was so 
much easier to do it, that I, for one, found it all but impossible to get any 
one to co-operate with me. 

I believe since that time the number of conventions have been less. I may 
be wrong there, but I know that a great many men who used to take active 
parts in these conventions have not taken part as they did before, because the 
law was in the hands of a set of officers. It was the duty of the law to sup- 
press the sale, and the law undertook to suppress it ; and there was no reason 
in the world, if it was intended to be carried out, that it was not carried out. 
We lost the moral power with which the law of 1832 had been sustained ; 
but the most important tiling was, that the moment you made that law, you 
made a general cause of rum on the one side, against temperance on the 
other. Every man that wanted to buy or sell, every man that wanted to keep 
a hotel and keep a bar, and every man that wanted to drink, united against 
the cause. And I have seen in the papers allusions to the associations that 
had been formed, and the sums of money that had been raised to carry on 
this struggle, until, as I understood, and as I have every reason to suppose, 
instead of meeting as before the individual action, you had to encounter the 
combined action of every man that was opposed for any cause to the progress 
of temperance. The law gave them a power in this, that the law itself recog- 
nized the propriety of the sale. If the law has not been changed within a 
week or two, I believe that there is a provision that there shall be agencies 
through the apothecaries for the sale in case of sickness, or in case of the arts 
or various other things, and thus recognizing the propriety and legality and 
the moral right, under certain circumstances, of the sale. It is not a general 
denial of the right to sell, either morally or legally. It therefore gave an 
opportunity for this combination, which has been operating since then. 
There has been a most constant struggle going on in the community, and 
unless there is a gross mis-statement in regard to the matter, (it is a thing 



APPENDIX. H 

Jiat I know nothing of personally,) my belief is that progress has been very 
slow, even if there has not been a retrograding. At any rate, at the end of 
fourteen years here stands the law, and in many places where 1 know- before 
there were no sales, and where there could be scarcely anybody found to 
drink, there are reputed to be those who drink freely. The question has 
occurred to me whether this experiment has not been tried so fairly that it 
would be worth the while to go back in part to the original position while you 
keep your law as it is. And I would go as far as any man to enforce it. Let 
the people have one, two or three men, if need be, licensed. Let them have 
the authority to do this, for they will then regulate who shall sell, instead of 
having these nuisances all over the country as they are now. And every 
respectable man, (if you can get respectable men to 'engage in the business,) 
will become a co-operator with the people in the community who have 
licensed him, in order that they may have the thing properly regulated so as 
to do as little evil as possible. 

I admit, Mr. Chairman, and I beg, in justice to my own consistency, to say 
that I do consider the selling of liquor under licenses to be a moral evil, and 
one which I would gladly avoid if possible. But of two evils I would choose 
the less ; and I believe it would be a less evil to carry on this sale under 
proper restrictions than to carry out the existing system of legislation. I 
believe that you would be doing a great deal more good by doing some evil 
than you would in leaving it as it is now. That is my conviction. It is an 
honest one. I may be mistaken ; I should be very glad to believe that I am. 
But the observations that I have made has not led me to believe the contrary. 
If you could put it into the hands of counties, there are counties in the State 
that would stop it. There are towns that would stop it^ The moment you 
put it into the hands of the towns they become interested, and they would 
take it into their hands and would unite (what I would desire above all things, 
and without which you cannot carry it through,) a moral power with the legal 
power to carry out the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) If I understand you, you would leave it to the 
action of counties ? 

A. Something of that kind. 

Q. Would not that be substantially a repeal of the peculiarity of the 
present law ? 

A. I would say that that is a peculiarity which I would be glad to get 
rid of. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I would like to ask you, whether from your observa- 
tion you believe that the present law can be enforced so as to check and 
prevent the increase of intemperance ? 

A. All I can say is, that I am not personally brought in contact with the 
class of people who are more affected by the use of drink. I can say that I 
have taken great interest in the inquiries upon this subject. No man has 
heard me oppose that law. But I have heard the matter discussed so often, 
and from such quarters, and from such a variety of quarters, that it is my 
judgment that it cannot be enforced. 

Q. Have you any opinion T from your own observation, or taking the 
information that you have received, that the extent of intemperance and the 



12 APPENDIX. 

extent of illegal sales now is very far from what is was when the people 
managed it themselves ? 

A. From information that I have, I believe that in the town of Leicester, 
for instance, and in the town of Worcester, and some of the other towns 
which I have mentioned, there are a great many more sales now than there 
were then. In the town of Worcester they have chosen year after year a 
temperance mayor, and they profess that they are going to inaugurate a 
reform every year ; and at the start half a dozen Irish women will be sent 
to the house of correction perhaps, and afterwards the matters goes by, and 
the current flows on as before. At any rate, it becomes necessary at the next 
election to select a new set of men to carry out the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What was the state of things in 1851 and '52 ? 
Was not the liquor sold there then ? 

A. I cannot fix the dates. I should think there was a decided difference 
between 1850 and 1853 or '54. My impression would be that the meetings 
after this law was passed were less, and that if sales were made they were 
made more secretly than they were at a subsequent period. 

Q. Don't you remember that in 1839, just before the Washingtonian 
reform, there was a very great discouragement among the temperance people ? 

A. I think there was after the repeal of the "fifteen-gallon law." We 
were very much disheartened, those of us in Worcester County. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Wasn't there more accomplished after the repeal 
of the " fifteen-gallon law " in restraining the drinking and selling of liquor in 
Worcester than in any other period before or since, so far as your information 
goes ? 

A. I should say there was. After the " fifteen-gallon law " there was a 
stagnation, and then there was a revival. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Was not that a period during which there was an 
activity in the cause of temperance, and in which Mr. Child himself was 
active and in favor of the prohibitory law ? 

A. I cannot say about that. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Up to the passage of the " fifteen-gallon law," 
in 1838, do you not recollect that the moral efforts had abated, if not entirely 
ceased ? 

A. I could not say. I should say that there was not so much zeal as there 
was at an earlier period. I should say that perhaps in 1832 or '33 there was 
more effort in the country than there was just before 1838. But I cannot 
say, as I do not remember any time from 1828 to 1852, when there were not 
frequent public meetings in Worcester County. I know that I went to a great 
number of towns, but I could not fix the times when I went nor where the 
meetings were most numerous. 

Q. Is it not your impression that up to 1837 or '38 there was a decided 
abatement of moral effort and a good deal of discouragement on the part of 
temperance men ? 

A. As I remember, there had been, in 1837, an effort made, and I con- 
fess I was one of those who had the conviction that the law was not strong 
enough for us, and that if we could produce a more stringent law we could 



APPENDIX. 13 

carry through the measures better. That was my belief about it, and I think 
you are right as regards the time. My impression was that if we could get a 
stronger law we could get on more successfully, and the law of 1838 was the 
result of that. I will not be certain about the date. 

Q. Did you ever know of any moral subject coming up and keeping the 
public mind with a pervading and general effort to change the public senti- 
ment, that lasted more than five or ten years ? Is it not a natural law that 
every effort of that kind will have particular periods of action ? 

A. I cannot give you any evidence on that point. I was very active pre- 
vious to that time, and I am not aware of my own feelings subsiding ; and I 
know that we had great obstacles to encounter, and my impression, as I stated 
before, is that we had a law of this kind at this time, and I recollect making 
a speech in favor of abolishing the license law ; and I argued with a view of 
bringing about such a state of things that everybody would see how much 
worse it would be without it, and become more disgusted with the use and sale 
of liquors generally. 

Q. Yes, sir ; I have heard that very doctrine preached. But is it not a 
fact, distinct in your mind, that from 1825 to 1835 — a period of ten years — 
there was a great deal of enthusiasm in the cause of temperance, and that, 
after that, the friends of the temperance cause abated their efforts, and that 
there was a state of discouragement among the temperance men, and that 
they ceased their moral efforts to a very great extent ? 

A. No, sir; I could not express it in that form. In 1828, there were no 
other men of our bar who were ready to go out and make temperance 
speeches. I remember it from various causes. I know that in 1828, and for 
four or five years afterwards, there were not enough men to go into the field. 
There was then a disposition on the part of many (and I had a very serious 
contest with many of my friends upon this matter,) to bring it into politics. 
I told them that the result of this would be that there would be too many men 
who were merely nominal temperance men. Afterwards there was a desire 
that there should be a more stringent law on the subject ; and that was 
produced in 1838. 

Q. I believe it to be a fact distinctly understood that, after 1838, the 
moral efforts of temperance men ceased to a very great extent ; and then 
came the Washingtonian reform, and that continued some three or four years. 
Now did not the Washingtonians drive almost everybody from the field ? 

A . They took a portion of the field to themselves. I never was associated 
with the Washingtonian movement, although I never opposed it. It was 
made up of men of a different character ; and while we were at work in one 
field, they were at work in different fields. I am not aware that they took 
the field that others had been occupying. They took a class of people that 
we could not reach. They would not come to our meetings. I should say 
that it was about that time (although I am not certain that it may not have 
been later than that,) that we used to have meetings in Worcester to which 
our. first men used to come, and in which they used to take part ; such men, 
for instance, as Governor Lincoln and William Lincoln. 

Q. Were they total abstinence men ? 

A. I cannot say, sir. 



14 APPENDIX. 

Q. Was Mr. Davis ? 

A. I could not say. But there was a time when we induced him to come 
forward, and he was an active man with us. He came forward and made 
one or two of the most eloquent speeches that I ever heard. But I should 
say that this was a good deal later than the time I speak of. 

Q. I want to ask you, if it is not a fact that the Washingtonians got the 
field, and that they kept it for three or four years, and that, although we 
kept up our moral efforts, yet the interest created by the Washingtonian 
movement was so remarkable that it succeeded almost everything else, and 
left us in the coldest and deadest state ? 

A. I thought the Washingtonian appeals most unnatural. 

Q. What I want to get at is this : My friend wants to make out that the 
cause is in a bad way, and that it is caused by the prohibitory law. I want 
to show by facts, which I distinctly recollect, that the lowest ebb of tempe- 
rance was about 1845, after the Washingtonian storm had spent itself; and 
that there has been, until within a few years, hardly a sermon preached 
upon this subject at all. Does not your recollection back me up in that ? 

A. No, sir; it does not: because the facts that I go upon go against it. 
From the record which I have read, I find that, in 1830, the number of 
licensed dealers in the county of Worcester was 371 ; in 1840, there were 6.9 
licensed retailers, and 105 inn-holders having licenses ; and in 1850, the 
number of retailers licensed was 36. The number of inn-holders licensed 
was not mentioned in 1850; but I should say that the number of inn-holders 
had diminished in proportion to the number of the retailers. 

Q. Can you call to your recollection the time when it used to be said in 
Worcester that there were few of the dealers who did not sell "rot-gut" ? 

A. I have no recollection. I know the subject was a matter of dis- 
cussion; and besides there were occasional prosecutions. Let me say one 
word here. After the time of the Washingtonian movement, the attempt 
was made to prevent conviction. It is a fact that I should not pass over. 
Manufacturers and a large number of persons were indicted, and the 
attempt was made to prevent jurors from convicting. But I can say, from 
my own personal knowledge, that jurors did convict universally in Worcester 
County. Men whom I knew were dealers in liquors were upon juries, and 
tried cases, and if the facts were proved, they came up boldly to the verdict. 
And I saw verdict after verdict where there was a conviction by jurors 
where some of them were said to be dealers in liquor. I recollect that, in 
1844 or '45, Mr. Hallett came out there to try some cases of this kind, where 
it was said that you could not convict ; but the jury came up boldly and 
fairly, and convicted. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Did the Court of Common Pleas hold its session in 
Boston at that time ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you hold it yourself? 
A. I did, some. 

Q. Was your experience in Boston different from what it is at present ? 
A. My attention has not been recalled to that; I should have to go and 
look at the record. But in these cases in Worcester County, knowing where 



APPENDIX. 15 

the juries came from, I took a deep interest ; and I recollect that the juries 
behaved like men. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) In your circle of social acquaintance twenty 
years ago, what was the habit in regard to the use of liquors ? 

A. Before 1828, 1 do not know of any families that pretended to anything 
like hospitality who did not make a free use of liquor. The most respectable 
and most religious people had it standing on their tables, or sideboards, or 
wherever it was. Twenty years ago, I should say that it was as rare to see 
liquor offered in a man's house as it would be to see medicine offered. With 
wine it is different. I know that in Worcester, at social parties, among the 
first families there were many where there was no wine offered. Spirituous 
liquor was a thing very rarely offered twenty years ago. 

Q. How is it now ? Has there been any change in that respect '? 
A. I could not say in the matter of spirituous liquor. I do not remember 
to have seen any spirituous liquor offered at any time. 
Q. You mean alcoholic liquors ? 

A . I mean alcoholic liquors. I see wine offered in some cases, and in 
some I do not. I see that it is quite common to advocate wine ; more com- 
mon than$ within my observation, it used to be. That is to say, I saw a great 
deal more wine drank in families, on social occasions, than I did twenty years 
ago. It may be because I come in contact with different individuals. 
Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How long have you lived in Cambridge ? 
A. About ten years. 

Q. You have been rather under Boston influence since then, have you 
not? 

A. I am not aware that I have. I was, of course, some. 
Q. Your associations have been in Boston ? Then you used to be in the 
country V 

A . That is so, certainly. 

Q. Would you not prohibit the sale of liquor if you could ? 
A . I would, sir, if I could. 

Q. Would you sustain the present law if you could ? 
A. I would, sir. 

Q. Do you know the number of cases which are now awaiting sentence ? 
A. No, sir; I do not. 

Q. Do you know the number in the State ? 
A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. Should you be surprised at five hundred ? 

A. I should think there would be a great many more than that. There 
ought to have been more than that. 

Q. Would you be surprised to find that from three to five thousand cases 
were now awaiting the rescript ? 
A. No, sir. 

Q. Would you think it wise to set aside the present laws, and thus set 
aside all these cases ? 

A. That is another point entirely. 

Q. Do you think the liquor-dealers who send in these petitions concui 
with you in this matter of a license system ? 



16 APPENDIX. 

A. I have never talked with a liquor-dealer upon this matter, and none of 
them have consulted with me. I should think that I would be the last man 
that a liquor-dealer would come to for any such purpose. 

Q. You believe that a license law would be restricting the sale somewhat? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. Do you think that the liquor-dealers have petitioned here, sir ? 

A. I do not know, sir. 

Q. What should you judge about it ? 

A. That is something which I cannot tell you. 

Q. What is your opinion, judging from human nature, about men engaged 
in a criminal business asking for a law restricting the carrying on of that 
business ? 

A. If that was the fact, I should say that they would find themselves 
badly bitten by such a law. But if we have a law, the effect of which is to 
cover up the manufacture and sale of liquor, I do not think it will be found 
to be a favorable one to the cause of temperance. 

Q. From your knowledge of human nature, would you expect men en- 
gaged in a criminal business to ask for a law restricting that business ? 

A. I should think not. 

Q. Why are liquor dealers so sensitive in regard to the non-execution of 






the present 1 

A. You are now taking me into a field that I am not at all acquainted 
with. I cannot be examined on that, because I am not acquainted with it. 
I have no recollection of saying a word to any liquor-dealer within the last 
ten years ; and we certainly have not discussed this matter. 

Q. Supposing that the State Constabularly should stand here and present 
facts, under oath, if you please, which shall show, not that the statute cannot 
be executed, but that it is executed, and that that is where the shoe pinches ? 

A. I do not put it so, for I think you may execute a law so as to do more 
harm than good by it ; that you may execute a law in such a manner as to 
produce odium against the law. I think you cannot (I may be wrong,) 
enforce the law against public sentiment ; that you must carry public senti- 
ment with you ; that you do not begin at the right end ; that to enforce the 
law by a few officers of the law is not the way to reach the reform that you 
desire. 

Q. Has not the complexion of the temperance movement been modified 
and tempered, and the public mind brought to a conviction which has 
expressed itself finally in the prohibitory law ? Is not that the intended 
utterance of the moral sentiment of the people of Massachusetts ? 

A. I think it is the utterance of those who intended to urge it individually. 

Q. Have they not urged it ? Are any of the traffickers unsatisfied ? 

A. I say that I have not passed a word with a liquor-dealer these ten 
years. 

Q. I would like to ask, if you had a license law such as you propose, and 
some of the counties carried it out, (as undoubtedly they would,) whether you 
believe that Boston would, or, left to itself, could execute it ? 

A. My belief is more a matter of probability, reasoning from cause to 
effect. My own belief is, that if you had left the law as it was in 1852, the 



APPENDIX. 17 

pressure from the country would have been so strong upon Boston that it 
could not have stood it. My belief is now, and was then, that if you begin 
with the country towns you will hedge in the business in Boston, so that it 
will be driven into the hollows and out-of-the-way places, so that it will not be 
respectable to deal in it. I do not suppose that you are going to stop the use 
of liquor. 

Q. Suppose it should appear that such a number of cases as I gave are 
now awaiting sentence, — not awaiting trial, but awaiting sentence, — undei 
the decision of which the minimum amount of fine is fifty dollars, and the 
maximum amount two hundred dollars. Do you think that the pronouncing 
of these sentences would be detrimental to the cause of temperance ? 

A. I do not think it would have any effect upon it. It might frighten 
some men. I think that if you had a license law, you could put the carrying- 
out of that system into the hands of those who would have some voice in the 
granting of the licenses ; and the men who would be licensed would combine 
with the friends of temperance, and you would have a better class of men 
licensed to sell than those who are engaged in it now. 

Q. Speaking of the operation of moral forces, do you think that a reform 
of this sort can be carried to its proper and legitimate end by moral suasion 
alone ? 

A. I believe that you will get a public sentiment so strongly in favor of 
prohibiting the sale that you will then be able to carry out your law, and that 
you will at last get the number of those who would be licensed so small that 
there would be (compared with what you have now,) hardly an appreciable 
evil ; there would be an evil which would be so much less than the present 
evil, that I should choose the first rather than the latter. 

Q. Do you suppose that after you get Boston, or any other city to a cer- 
tain point, that the business of selling can be restricted any farther by means 
of moral suasion ? 

A. My opinion is, that if you can get a moral sentiment behind the law, 
you will grow stronger and stronger, instead of weaker ; and I would have 
the law come up as far as I could ; I would have it like a cog upon a wheel, 
so that it should hold on to whatever progress had been made. 

Q. Is not that the point we have come to ? 

A. I don't think you have. I don't think the law is going to stop drinking. 
I do not believe you reach the average judgment of the people. 

Q. The prohibitory law has its sanction and penalty. And after all the 
discussion by which the law has been procured, and so far sustained upon the 
application of moral principle, what other action have the people ? And 
yet, you say, abandon it. 

A. I think you have relied more upon the power of the law. 

Q. Have we not been applying moral principle through the law ? 

A. All I can say in regard to that is, that under the old arrangement 
there were twenty men ready on all public occasions to advocate the cause of 
temperance, where there is one now. 

Q. Liquor dealers' combinations have been referred to ? 

A. I have heard of them. 

3 



18 APPENDIX. 

Q. Are you aware that they are rent asunder, from lack of funds to carry 
the thing through ? 

A. No, sir. I was not aware that a dollar had been paid in by these 
associations. 

Q. In any great conflict, when the forces have been marshalled, and stand 
in solid array, and at the moment when an issue is to be determined, is that a 
time to retreat ? Is this a time for the friends of temperance to throw the 
question into the hands of the opposing forces, and allow them to regulate 
temperance ? 

A. If I could divide the enemy, and take two or three at a time, I should 
say that that was better strategy. 

Q. When you assail them man by man, don't you separate them ? 

A. You do not separate the means of business ; and you do not defeat 
the means of business. 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 19 



SECOND DAY. 

Wednesday, February 20, 1867. 
The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing was resumed. 

Testimony of Rev. James A. Healy. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long have you lived in Boston ? 

A. About twelve years and a half. 

Q. You are a priest of the Catholic Church ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been engaged in your vocation as priest, in this 
city? 

A. Since August, 1854. I was until recently secretary of Bishop Fitz- 
patrick. 

Q. About how large a number of Catholics belong to your parish ? 

A. I am not exactly capable of telling you the number; but I should 
think every Sunday there must be from five to six thousand people at different 
times. 

Q. You have then several different services ? 

A. I have several different services in church every Sunday. The church 
is filled every Sunday, and there are many standing up. 

Q. Your position of secretary of Bishop Fitzpatrick — did that give you 
any opportunities of knowing the position of the Catholic people ? 

A. Not that precise position ; but I was most of that time provisional rec- 
tor of the Cathedral, and had a pretty good opportunity by that means of 
seeing the position of people of the congregation. I have also had charge of 
the poor of that congregation ; I have also had charge of that congregation 
for the last ten years, so that I have had occasion to see a good deal of the 
poor people of the congregation and their manner of life. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state in your own way, and from your 
point of view, the present condition of the cause of practical temperance 
among the poor and humble classes of the people of your congregation, and 
the effect, so far as you have been able to discern, concerning the operations 
of the existing system of legislation thereon ? 

A. Well, I should say, briefly, that the condition of things' at this present 
time was rather discouraging ; that, so far as I have been able to observe, there 
never was more intemperance than there is at the present time ; that intem- 
perance has spread from the men to the women and children, and there are a 
great number who come to me, (and there are a great many of them who 
come to me during every week,) to take the pledge ; nearly one-half of 
that number are women ; and the reason, so far as my experience goes is, that 
at this present time, liquor is not only used in each house, but is brought into 
each family. Instead of being sold in public places, in almost every house 
(and every tenement having a number of families in it,) they have some 



20 APPENDIX. 

liquor and they sell to those in the house. The consequence is, that it is 
brought into the family, and there the women take it when the husband is 
out. So far as my observation goes, I think the use of liquor has widely 
spread among the poorer classes. My own observation in this respect has 
been pretty direct, and I have noticed the concurrent testimony of many 
among my brethren that there never was so much intemperance as now, and 
this, oftentimes among the women. I have seen children twelve or thirteen 
years of age who were confirmed drunkards ; and these people are able at 
the present time to get their liquor without its being known. The conse- 
quence is, that men and women are not ashamed to get this liquor, because 
they can get it in their houses. I suppose that in the locality where a portion 
of my congregation reside, there is scarcely a house where liquor is not more 
or less sold. 

Q. What observation, if any, have you made of the quality of the liquor 
which is sold in this contraband and furtive manner ? 

A. I think I should have to produce the testimony of those who have 
judged of it in other countries. I have had some knowledge of it in France, 
where the manufacture of it is under strict government surveillance ; but in 
this country, we remark with astonishment, that among the Catholic people 
there are frequent cases of delirium tremens ; and that after a very moderate 
portion of this liquor has been taken. I have heard aged priests, coming 
here from Ireland, say that they had scarcely heard of a case of this kind in 
Ireland ; and tliey attributed it to the fact that liquor manufactured there — 
which is to a considerable extent in private stills — is simply from grain and 
malt ; and they state that in this country a very small quantity of the liquor 
which is sold to the poor, will generally make them frantic whenever they 
attempt to restrict it. I might quote an instance where I had occasion to visit a 
man whose wife and daughter were urging him very earnestly to take the pledge. 
I reasoned with him for some time, but he was unwilling to take the pledge. 
He expressed a willingness to take it the next week. The man was by no 
means drunk. I asked him his reason. He said the fever was on him and he 
must get drunk. He was under some excitement, and I had to exercise all 
the authority that I was able to bring to bear, in addition to the solicitations 
of his wife, who was lying upon her dying bed, to persuade him to take the 
pledge then, and promise that he would not get drunk that night; and he told 
me after he had given me his promise, that it was the greatest struggle that 
he had ever had. I attributed it and he attributed it to the quality of the 
liquor. 

Q. What do you judge to be the moral efi'ect of the present system of 
legislation ? 

A. I suppose I ought to begin by stating that it is not only my own 
opinion, but also the opinion of many of those with whom I have been asso- 
ciated, that the moral effect of the present law upon this class of people, is 
very bad. These people consider that the poor are the ones who are 
oppressed in this matter ; and the consequence is, that being sent to the jail 
or House of Correction, under the present law, does not seem to attach any 
disgrace to it. Again, considering that it is no crime to use liquor, there is 
no stigma attached to the sale of liquor. I do not look upon it at the present 



APPENDIX. 21 

time as having any moral force with the masses of the population. I consider 
that if it was made a public matter, and if licenses were issued, and if these 
licenses were put under a proper control, the moral effect would be much 
greater, and the disgrace of breaking over this law would be the same as in 
the infraction of any other law. 

Q. You mentioned being in France ; how long were you there ? 

A. Two years. 

Q. Did you have any opportunity to observe, the difference between the 
population with whom you were concerned there and those with whom you 
have been concerned in Boston, in respect to this one fact of temperance or 
intemperance ? 

A. I can say that I was in Paris for two years, and I never saw a man 
drunk, and I have travelled recently over a good part of Europe, having 
touched at almost every port of Spain, and also the southern part of France ; 
also in Italy ; and I never saw a drunken man, nor any sign of one. 

Q. Supposing this present law were so executed as that the selling of 
liquor would apparently disappear, so that there should be no visible and 
tangible traffic in liquor, do you then believe that the traffic would cease 
entirely ? 

A. Well, if I should state my conviction, I should say I am sure it would 
not. I could name localities where I do not think the officers would find any 
sales of liquor, and there would be no appearance of liquor being sold at 
the present time ; and yet where there is a great quantity of liquor sold every 
day in the week. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Do these persons who take the pledge commonly 
keep it, or does it only last a very short time ? 

A. Sometimes they take pledges of their own accord, and of their own 
accord they mention for how long a time they will take it. The general 
average is a year. Sometimes they take it for such a period of their life. 
Sometimes they fall back, and at the end of a year, perhaps, they will have a 
good " blow out." 

Q. The influence of the pledge, then, is pretty strong ? 

A. Yes, sir; a great number of them keep their pledges. We do not 
make it as a religious vow ; we make it more as a pledge of honor, acting on 
the principle that there is no sin in the drinking of liquor according to any 
moral principle that we know of. We cannot make a sin where there is 
none ; and accordingly we say to them that the liquor has a very injurious 
effect on them, and we say to them that their honor and their interests require 
that they should give up drinking it. Wherever we can, we obtain such 
pledges as this. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you say it is no sin for a man to do an injury 
to himself? 

A. Yes, sir ; it is a sin. 

Q. Do you not think that the use of liquor is always an injury to a man ? 

A. No, sir ; I am sure it is not. 

Q. Would you recommend to a member of your congregation to use 
liquor ? 

A. That is an individual matter. 



22 APPENDIX. 

Q. Why do you ask a man to sign the pledge ? 

A. For the reason that his own experience has proved drinking injurious 
to him. 

Q. How uniform do you find the injury to be ? 

A. That depends upon the character of the individual. 
Q. Are any of your clergymen total abstainers ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you, yourself ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You therefore hold such views and your communion holds such views, 
that the use of intoxicating liquor and the sale of it are proper ? 

A. Where they are well regulated, sir. 

Q. How would you regulate it ? 

A. You might ask how I would regulate the strength of it ; I cannot tell 
you, because my experience has been in countries where they use it not only 
day after day, but at every hour in the day ; and where I have never seen 
a man drunk. 

Q. Were you ever in Marseilles ? 

A. I was in Marseilles and also in Paris. 

Q. Did you not see drunkenness there ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Did you visit Scotland ? 

A. I never did, sir. 

Q. Are you aware of the result of drinking of liquor there ? 

A. I have seen many that have been there, and have heard that its results 
are terrible beyond belief. 

Q. How will you explain that ? 

A. I judge of it from the fact that they drink stronger liquor there. In 
Marseilles they do not drink strong liquor as a rule. 

Q. Do you mean that they do not drink distilled liquor ? 

A. They drink wine a great deal. 

Q. Is not there a great deal of distilled' liquor drank ? 

A. I do not know what you mean by distilled liquor. 

Q. I mean a class of alcoholic liquors not produced by fermentation, but 
produced by distillation ? 

A. If you mean whiskey, they do not drink much whiskey there. They 
drink brandy more. But you will observe that they drink it in small glasses, 
the same way as we drink cordial. A man drinking coffee, will drink a little 
brandy afterwards, perhaps ; but it is only about three thimbles full. 

Q. You say that liquor is drank in almost every family in the locality of 
which you spoke ? 

A. In almost every family, sir. 

Q. It is not made in every house, is it ? 

A. I do not understand that it is. 

Q. How do you account for it that the people who come here are so differ- 
ently affected by it, from what they were in Ireland ? 



APPENDIX. 23 

A. There is not so much traffic there as here, I take it. I do not hear of 
people in Ireland being so much affected by it. I am speaking of the experi- 
ence of those who have come from Ireland. 

Q. Is not the liquor which is distilled there contraband ? 
A. A good deal of it is contraband there, and I think it is purer than 
government liquor. 

Q. Government exercises supervision over liquor ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you judge the liquor here to be good or bad ? 
A. I judge it very bad. 
Q. How do you obtain satisfactory liquor ? 
A. From those who are satisfactory parties. 

Q. Perhaps it would be desirable, on the part of some, to know where good 
liquor can be found ? 

A. I presume the gentlemen of the Committee would be able to tell where 
it is found, for themselves. » 

Q. Are you not giving a general opinion that the liquor which is sold is 
bad? 

A. I think some of it is very bad. 

Q. You speak of the moral result of the prohibitory law ; and you place it 
on the ground that the poor are entangled by it, and not the rich ; if its ope- 
ration was equally upon the rich, would there not be the same lack of moral 
result manifested ? 
A. I think so. 
Q. Why? 

A. Because I do not think there is any sin attached to it. 
Q. Then the use of it is not a sin anywhere ? 
A. No, sir. 
Q. Nor the sale ? 
A. Nor the sale. 

Q. Then your people do not consider that it is a sin ? 
A . I said that the excess would be a sin, and the excess, as now found, is 
a sin. 

Q. Do you think the habitual use of alcoholic liquors tends to create a 
tendency to drunkenness ? 

Q. (By Mr. Healy.) Do you consider wine an alcoholic liquor ? 
A. (By Mr. Miner.) Somewhat, sir. 

A. (By Mr. Healy.) Not necessarily; for I have seen the people of 
other countries where there is a constant use of wines ; where the custom is 
universal ; where I have seen no cases of intoxication ; and I might cite an 
instance of a community in France where I lived for two years, and there 
were some three hundred young men, where a case of intoxication would 
astonish the community, and where, if there had been a case of this kind, it 
would probably have been handed down from one generation to another. I 
never heard of such a thing. 

Q. Perhaps the record was not kept so strictly as in other matters ? 
A. I think if the instance had occurred it would have been recorded. 
Q. Do you know of no cases of drunkenness upon wine ? 



24 APPENDIX. 

4. I cannot say that I do. 

Q. Never have ? 

A. Never have. If I did I should tell you. 

Q. Do you believe, license law or no license law, prohibitory law or no 
prohibitory law, that wines will ever come to be the staple alcoholic drink in 
this country ? 

A. I cannot go so far in my calculation. I do not know what the result 
may yet be. According to the reports which we now have, the manufacture 
of wine in the West, especially in California, is on the increase. I cannot tell 
what may come of it. 

Q. Do you know Mr. Stone, formerly the pastor of the Park Street 
Church in this city ? 

A. I know of him. I never have seen him that I know of. 

Q. Are you aware that he has been called, since going to San Francisco, 
to bear testimony to the deleterious influence of those wines ? 

A. I never heard of it. | 

Q. You are not prepared to gainsay that ? 

A. No, sir. I have seen these California wines. I do not know what 
should be so very intoxicating about them, unless they manufacture them 
badly, or put in something that would give an extra strength in order to suit 
the American taste. Unless they have adulterated the wines in that way, I 
do not know why they should be so very injurious. 

Q. Do you have that class of feeble wines in this country which you find 
in European countries ? 

A. Not generally : except these native wines ; I consider them as feeble 
wines. 

Q. Do you not think that the continual use of intoxicating liquors has a 
direct tendency towards drunkenness ? 

A. I say, that in most cases you have got to judge of individuals, as to 
whether it is likely to tend Jo excess. You might as well ask me if smoking 
did not tend to excess in the same way ; it is the same thing. 

Q. What is the law of artificial appetites ? 

A. I am sure I don't know, sir. 

Q. As a priest of a Catholic Church, looking upon the mass of communi- 
cants, do they generally use liquor ? 

A . They do, sir. 

Q. You have testified to that ? 

A . I have testified to that. 

Q. How would a license law make it any better ? 

A . It would prevent them from bringing it on to their tables. 

Q. "Why, if you have a licensed store on every corner ? 

A. It would not be at every corner. 

Q. That would depend upon the character of the law, and how it was 
executed. Did you ever know of its being executed ? 

A. I do not know that I have, in this country. 

Q. Do you observe, so far as concerns your own congregation, that the 
use of intoxicating liquors tends quite uniformly to drunkenness ? 



APPENDIX. 25 

Q. (By Mr. Healy.) Do you mean to ask whether the majority of my 
congregation are drunkards ? Is that the question in plain words ? 

A. (By Mr. Miner.) I mean the class of your congregation of which 
you have been speaking. 

A. Will you put it in some shape in which I can take it better. 

Q. Did you not state that men, women, and children, in these houses, by 
reason of the liquor sold in these tenements, are drunk ? 

A. I did not, sir. 

Q. What did you say ? 

A . I said that they drank, and that there were more drunkards than at 
any time I have known. 

Q. Can you say where legitimate drunkenness commences ? 

A . That is not for me to determine. That is for the man himself to 
determine. If I see a man who is injuring himself by excessive drinking, J 
may urge him to refrain from using it. 

Q. Then you do not hesitate to judge of a man as to the question of his 
drinking ? 

A. Not if it is a plain case. 

Q. Does not the action of alcohol tend to make a man drunk ? 

A. I do not know that it does, necessarily, sir. 

Q. What is the effect of it ? 

A . Well, we read that wine " maketh the heart of man glad ; " that is one 
effect of it. There may be other effects ; but I never heard of its making a 
man drunk all at once. 

Q. In relation to having liquor upon the tables of those of your communi- 
cants to whom you refer, how does it appear that they would not have all the 
facilities under a license law that they do now ? 

A. I should think you would see, sir, that if it is within their reach, in 
their own houses, and they have no opportunity of being ashamed of getting 
it, they would be likely to use it with less restraint than they would if they 
had to go further from their houses to get it. 

Q. Do they manufacture it in their own houses ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How, then, do they have easier access to it than they would under the 
action of the license law ? 

A. I said that in a great number of these tenement houses, liquor is sold 
in the houses. 

Q. Why can't they do that just the same under a license law as now ? 

A. They would not dare to do it, because I think the law would be 
enforced then, and they would see that it was a fair trade. 

Q. How do you make it out a fair trade when under restrictions ? 

A . Just the same as the gunpowder trade, perhaps. 

Q, You have observed that there would be no difficulty in getting liquor 
at the licensed places ? 

A . Not that exactly ; but I don't think there would be the same tempta- 
tion as then, simply because they would buy it at the places licensed, instead 
of keeping it and drinking it in their houses. 
4 



26 APPENDIX. 

Q. Suppose the present law were carried out quite uniformly, do you 
think the traffic could be broken down ? 

A . I think people would get it. 

Q. Are you sure of it ? 

A . I believe that it is so. I am not among those who put down their 
opinions as unquestionable ; but I think that it would be so. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are not a native of this country, are you ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Were you here when Father Mathew was here, and did you know 
him? 

A . I was then a student at Worcester College, and I saw him there. 

Q. Do you recollect that a great many persons signed the pledge through 
his efforts ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. Did he make use of any liquors of any kind ? 

A. I cannot say. I have heard the matter talked of pleasantly among 
friends, and a variety of statements made on that point. I never heard any- 
body who was very sensible attach much importance to it any way. He was 
considered to be a devout man, and I do not suppose that the question as to 
whether he drank wine occasionally or not, would have any great influence 
upon the estimate of his personal character. 

Q. He was a pledged man, was he not ? 
' A . I cannot say as to that. 

Q. Have you any doubt but that he was strictly pledged ? 

A. I never thought it worth the while to inquire, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Was the pledge that he circulated one to abstain 
entirely from the use of it, or simply from drunkenness ? 

A. It was a pledge to totally abstain. 

Q. How many who signed that pledge kept it for four or five years ? 

A. I have no means of judging. I have found a great many who have 
kept it from that time until this day. Some have kept it until recently, and 
have come to me to renew it. 

Q. Do you not consider that his efforts were a great blessing ? 

A. Certainly, a great blessing. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you think that a man would be as successful 
in obtaining pledges, if he was not himself a total abstainer ? 

A. I have not examined that question at all. As I told you, when we 
put this matter before people, the church and the law of Almighty God (as 
we understand it,) not making it any sin to take intoxicating drinks, if not 
taken to excess, and, therefore, the thing itself not being a sin, we cannot 
say to this man, You are a worse man for taking it. 

Q. Why don't you pledge your men to moderation ? 

A. Because they show that they are not always capable of keeping 
within the bounds of moderation. There are some men who, although they 
are men of great capacity, and ability, and strength of mind in other direc- 
tions, yet, in this respect, seem to have physical or constitutional weakness, 
and especially those who have in the system a tendency to consumption. We 
have remarked, that with them, as a rule, there is a craving for stimulants, 



APPENDIX. 27 

although they are very dangerous to them. There are also men who are 
very excitable ; and sometimes a spoonful will set a man's brain on fire, when 
another man will take quite a large quantity without as much effect upon him. 

Q. Then you do not mean that you think the use of liquor is weakening 
to one's self-control — tending to make an attempt at moderation unsuccessful ? 
You would not attribute that to the use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A . I do not say so. 

Q. How do these men happen to be in a weak position ? 

A. I cannot explain that matter ; it may be a constitutional weakness in 
one case ; with another, it may be the company which he frequents. It is 
sometimes bravado, to see who will drink the most. There are ten thousand 
different things that will sometimes bring a man down. 

Q. I should like to ask you, Mr. Ilealy, whether, in your opinion, the 
habitual use of alcoholic stimulants has a tendency to weaken self-control ? 

A . Well, I should say, directly and positively, no, sir ; if you take it as a 
general rule throughout the world* If you take it in some countries, espe- 
cially in those farther north, there seems to be more of an excess in the 
extent to which strong drink is used. In fact, you might almost draw a 
geographical line of division. 

Q. Then you do not hold your rule as applicable to New Englanders ? 

A. I do not know whether I should not. I don't know whether they may 
be further north or south. 

Q. Which way are we journeying, do you think ? 

A | Well, according to the present appearance, I should think we were get- 
ting rapidly north. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that one reason why these people whom 
you alluded to were in the habit of drinking, was that they felt that the law 
itself was an injustice ? 

A. I did not put that as the cause why they drink. I said that that was 
the reason why they did not feel it a crime to infringe it, because the law was 
so administered that the rich escaped and the poor were taken. 

Q. I think you said that they felt that the action of this law was unjust 
upon the poor ? 

A . I did not say that therefore they drank. I said that therefore they did 
not think it was a crime to violate the law. 

Q. Suppose you have a law where a hundred of the best citizens are per- 
mitted to sell liquor in the city of Boston, and everybody else was forbidden 
— that your common people are forbidden. Will that commend itself to their 
sense of justice and lead them to respect the law ? 

A. They- would look upon it as impartial. All that they want is to get it ; 
if they get it, at the same price as others. I do not see where the difficulty 
would be, if the State regulate this matter of sale. I do not think any of my 
flock would regret it. Many do regret that the temptation was so very near 
at hand. 

Q. You say that in almost every tenement somebody sells it. Somebody 
lets the rooms, and the tenants feel under a sort of obligation to buy of him ? 

A. I have heard so. • 



28 APPENDIX. 

Q. You say that the buyer cannot get it if the rich are licensed, and that 
they ■will send out and get it, and that here in almost every tenement is a man 
who has an interest in selling it. What will this man who sells say if he is 
cut out of his sale ? 

A. He may possibly think he has lost something. I have no doubt many 
of them might. At the same time I understand that the question was one as 
to whether the sale of liquor is a matter which can be regulated, and I think 
it can be better regulated than it is at the present time. If you ask if it can 
be suppressed, I do not think it can ; I am not positive. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you think the execution of the law as it is 
going forward at the present time tends to increase the sale ? 

A. I could not tell ; it has not been executed, I think, a sufficient time. I 
should say that it had only driven it out of sight, but not out of the way. 

Q. Has there been any execution of the law in Boston ? 

A. Not until recently, that I remember. 

Q. Are you in the habit of taking liquor yourself? 

A . Yes, sir, when I want it. 

Q. You always do it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You think that, if the present law continues being executed as it is in 
Boston, it is doubtful whether it would lessen the sale or the consumption ? 

A. This is a particular trade, and it is something for which we have a 
tendency in this country, and which cannot be so easily controlled as in other 
matters. The traffic is one to which we have such a universal tendency in 
this country that I judge that it will be carried on in spite of all laws. 

Q. Then your doctrine is that the traffic in liquor cannot be stopped, and 
that it is a mere question as to where and when it shall be sold ? 

A . About so, sir. 

Q. Then you do not stand here as a petitioner for restricting it to a 
license ? 

A. I think a license law will restrict the sale of liquor. 

Q. How, sir ? 

A. By confining it in better regulated channels where you can reach it 
better. 

Q. Will you define what you mean by well regulated ? 

A. You put the matter in such a form that I cannot answer you fairly. 
You put it that it is an instrumentality which at all times is bad, and that it 
is sold to make people drunk. I might instance to you the French law, where 
there are regular licenses by the government. I should think such a system 
might be executed here. They do not set it down that there shall be such a 
number of places. They do not let everybody have a license. But it is 
under the control of the government, and those who break over the laws are 
subject to the punishment of confiscation. 

Q. Then your opinion is in favor of a license law ? 

A. Yes, sir, if it is confined to a license which is high enough. 

Q. How can you restrict the access to it, when you have open access to it 
on the part of everybody, though it be* by a license law? 



APPENDIX. 29 

A. For the reason, as I told you, that very frequently, as in the instances 
of these families which I have spoken of, there is access to it because it is 
brought into their houses, and is where they can get it and drink it any time. 
I think if you had any experience in that, you would find that these families 
get drink because it is brought right into their houses, whereas formerly it 
was not so much. 

Q. How many places for sale would you have in Boston ? 

A. I have not given that subject a moment's consideration. 

Q. (By Mr. Mixer.) How many of your people are habitual drinkers ? 

A . I never have made any estimate. I suj^pose that a greater number of 
them are addicted to it more or less. It is an invariable rule on the other 
continent that wine or beer should be used at the table, and most of them, 
after coming to this country, follow up the practice more or less. 

Q. Are there many of them who are in the habit of drinking brandy ? 

A. Some of them. I do myself when I want it. 

Q. Are there any among them who are total abstainers ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Can you give one ? 

A. I should not call the names of any persons. 

Testimony of Rev. Geo. F. Haskins. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long have you lived in Boston ? 

A. All my life. 

Q. How long have you been a clergyman ? 

A. About twenty-three years. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state to the Committee where your parish 
has been, and what has been your sphere of occupation as priest ? 

A. I have been parish priest at the North End of Boston since 1846, 
having charge of all that part of the North End from Prince Street around 
by Commercial Street to Quincy Market, and down Hanover Street, and in 
that section. 

Q. Have you any other charge save that of parish priest ? 

A. I have also charge of the House of the Angel Guardian for boys. 

Q. Where, sir ? 

A. At Roxbury. 

Q. For the instruction and care of boys ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is the number of boys ? 

A. The congregation the past year was about two or three hundred boys. 

Q. How large is the congregation at the North End ? 

A. From ten to twelve thousand. 

Q. Is it so large that you have assistance ? 

A. Two clergymen assist me. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state to the Committee what is the result 
of your experience and observation as parish priest, and as having charge 
of the House of the Angel Guardian, and also as a visitor among the poor ; of 
the operation of the existing laws upon the temperance or intemperance of 
the people ? 



30 APPENDIX. 

A. I am not able to say how far that law has operated with regard to the 
change that I am going to speak of. When I first took charge of the parish, 
in 1846, there was not a great deal of drunkenness among the lower people in 
my congregation ; at least, I did not discover much. I did not see much of 
it, and I did not discover or hear of much drunkenness, until within the last 
five or six years ; but now I can say that it is very excessive. The vast 
multitude, the mass of my congregation of ten thousand, are temperate 
people ; but there are certain classes of persons which have very much 
increased among us, and these are people who drink to excess ; and I have 
found that there are more cases of women and children,- within the last two 
or three years, women especially, whose husbands have come to complain of 
them for drunkenness, and who have come with their husbands to take the 
pledge. There are more of these than ever before in my experience. The 
cause of it I am unable to state, and would not venture even an opinion 
about it. I do not know what causes it. The liquor-selling places seem to 
have multiplied, there being more smaller ones as the larger ones have 
decreased. Many persons have given up the sale of intoxicating liquors, and 
dealers that dealt rather extensively in it in my district have given it up, 
their places being closed by the authorities. But I have found evidence, and 
I have every reason to believe, from the reports of my assistants, as well as 
from my own observation, that the consequence has been that the trade has 
been crushed down into the lower classes of the people, and shoots out into 
spurs, so to speak, and starts up into smaller branches. That seems to me to 
have been the case, but I would not say what it was caused by. That 
appears to be the fact as far as I have observed. 

Q. Have you any opinion on this question ; and if so, what is it — whether 
drunkenness and the tendency to excessive drink could be better managed by 
the clergy and others endeavoring to exercise the moral influence upon the 
public, rather than under the present system of furtive, contraband traffic ? 

A. Well, sir, if the traffic could be dispensed with altogether, if it could 
be stopped, it is my opinion that it would be the best thing ; but I am of the 
opinion that it could not be done. There is among certain classes of men, 
and among all classes, probably, more or less of a craving for stimulants ; 
that is, among certain persons of certain constitutions many seem to crave it. 
If they cannot get spirits they will get tobacco ; and if they cannot get that 
they will have opium ; and if they cannot get that they will have strong 
coffee or something that will stimulate them. I think that has been the expe- 
rience of those who have studied physiology — that there are certain constitu- 
tions that crave excitement. Now, I do not know that any law will prevent 
this. If the laws prevent the buying of liquor in small quantities, the people 
will buy in large quantities ; and if the law should prevent their going to the 
store to buy a glass of something to drink, then people would go where they 
could get a gallon, or a small cask, or an original package, and that would be 
conveyed into their closets, and probably the landlord of the tenement where 
they live, as has been stated by Mr. Healy, would be the one who would get 
it, and would probably give it to the others. Therefore I think it is for the 
interest of morality and temperance to control the sale of these liquors. I 
suppose that they will be sold somehow. If the sale could be checked alto- 



APPENDIX. 31 

gether, it would be a desirable object to attain ; but if tbere will be a sale 
some way or other, it is best to have the strong arm of the law direct it. 
That is my opinion. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do these tenements command a high rent ? 

A. They are generally controlled by some one man. Generally some 
one man hires a whole block or a whole building, and lets it out to tenants. 
If it is a large building, they are likely to keep a shop. I do not say that 
this is so always, but it is so very frequently. In my parish, these little shops 
at the corner are very common ; and I think if you go into them you will 
not see any appearance of the sale of liquor ; but still I am confident that 
there is a jug or a demijohn somewhere. 

Q. Those who control these tenements are generally interested in getting 
the liquor into the tenements? 

A. Yes, sir; they are interested because they like to make the profits off 
the sales. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do these tenants pay higher rents than ordi- 
nary ? 

A. Well, sir, I do not know about that. They generally pay high rents. 
The owners, who generally live up town, find it very profitable. 

Q. Do you suppose the owners have any objections to the carrying on of 
that business ? 

A. Some of them are and some of them are not ; some of them are very 
indifferent. 

Q. Is there not a very much worse use made of some of those tenements 
than the sale of liquor, and is not that use prevalent in the region you have 
spoken of? 

A. Well, sir, in the region of North Street, I suppose there are worse 
uses. 

Testimony of Ex-Gov. John H. Clifford. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Will you be kind enough to inform the Com- 
mittee what your means of observation have been, during the last twenty or 
thirty years, of the operation of the laws, particularly of the criminal laws of 
Massachusetts, and how the existing system of legislation compares with past 
legislation in its advantages relative to the subject of temperance, or the sale 
and use of spirituous liquors ? I state the question broadly, in order that 
you may answer without specific interrogatories. 

A. I ought perhaps to say, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, that it was only 
quite late last night that I received the summons to appear here, and with no 
knowledge of the specific purpose that the parties had in view. I have there- 
fore given no such consideration to the general subject as would enable me to 
express any opinions that I may entertain (though I have very decided opin- 
ions upon this whole subject) in a manner that would be satisfactory to the 
Committee or counsel. I must therefore reply to the question as to experience 
very generally by saying, that I have had a very extended experience as a 
prosecuting officer in this Commonwealth, having held the office of Attorney- 
General, or District Attorney, for about twenty years. I had the honor, 
ten or eleven years ago (I think 1856,) to express my views of the then 



32 APPENDIX. 

existing legislation, in an official form, by a report which I made, as Attor- 
ney-General, to the legislature. I have now really forgotten the substance 
of that. I only know it was esteemed, by those who did not agree with me 
in opinion, of sufficient importance to call out from the State Temperance 
Committee a reply, which was published in the form of a pamphlet. How 
much my friend, Mr. Spooner, has knowledge of that matter, he can tell 
better than I can. 

But I had no occasion to be dissatisfied with the reply. It was a difference 
of opinion ; the author of the pamphlet took a very different view of the 
matter from what I had taken, and in his discussion of it, treated the views 
which I there presented, with entire respect, both for me and my opinion ; so 
that I never felt at all hurt, whoever the author of the pamphlet might have 
been. The reply was, of course, to controvert the views which I had 
expressed. 

The opinion that I expressed in that report was one which I have enter- 
tained ever since ; that the subject of the sale of intoxicating drinks, was a 
subject of regulation, and not of prohibition. I regard the excessive use of 
intoxicating drinks as, with a single exception, the most destructive to the 
morals of the community. I have always supposed that it was competent for 
the intelligence, the love of morality, the sense of the importance of preserv- 
ing the manhood of the people, for the intelligence of Massachusetts assembled 
in its legislature, to make such provision by legislation as, without attempting 
the impossible, to accomplish some substantial good, in the way of regulation. 
I held those opinions when I was in an official position that brought constantly 
to my notice the impracticability of success in absolute prohibition. I think 
I ventured upon a prophesy in that report, that when the people of Massachu- 
setts understood the operation and effect of that law, some change would be 
demanded by them. I have not been in a position of late years to make an 
examination in these matters as closely as I did then, but as a citizen of the 
Commonwealth, I have seen nothing to change that opinion. I still think 
that this great problem of how the youth of the State are to be saved, in the 
first place, from temptation, and in the second place, from being precipitated 
into desolation and ruin, after having yielded to it, is the greatest problem we 
have before us ; and is one which is susceptible of some adjustment, which 
shall be effectual. I have not undertaken to ask by petition that the legis- 
lature should enact a license law. I do not know what conclusion I should 
come to, as a legislator, as to the mode. The only decided opinion that I 
have, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, is that the existing legislation is not 
promotive of the morality of the community. And, if the Committee will 
pardon me, I cannot help believing that the condition of things in which we 
are placed, and that this exigency, by which so grave a problem, one s6 
apparently impossible of solution, is presented, is due in a very great measure 
to the fact that men do not act up to their convictions. I will not say that 
there is moral cowardice in it ; but the fear of being classed with those who 
are indifferent to the public morals, has had much to do with preventing legis- 
lators from addressing themselves seriously to the great task, and accomplish- 
ing something which will be efficient. It is the understanding, and has been 
for years, amongst the legislature and among the people, that if a man 



APPENDIX. 33 

expresses an opinion which is in derogation, in the slightest degree, of the 
existing legislation, feeble and helpless as it seems to be to accomplish any- 
thing, that he is to be classed with those who have either opposed good order 
and sobriety, or are in favor of the use of intoxicating liquors. I think that is 
a fatal mistake ; it is a mistake, however, which belongs to us as a people. It 
runs into all our politics. It prevents a man to-day, from expressing his 
honest -convictions sometimes, with reference to national affairs ; so that a 
certain expression of opinion, will class one as a copperhead. And yet he may 
entertain opinions which men of strictest loyalty may maintain. So in this 
question, which involves a great moral element, they are more apt to treat it 
with indifference, than to treat it on its own specific merits. I think the 
merits of any system of legislation consist in some of its specific merits. And 
it has always been found, that if a certain persistency in a legislative proceed- 
ing does not accomplish the object designed by those who instituted it, it is 
the part of wisdom to resort to some other. If the end be what I regard this 
to be on the part of all these gentlemen, on both sides of this question (as far 
as I know these gentlemen or their views,) it has been to promote the real 
interest of the people of this Commonwealth. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) A remark which was dropped incidentally from 
your lips, leads me to ask whether, as a jurist, you have had occasion to con- 
sider this subject in relation to the limitation of legislative power? 

A. It was because of my having given much consideration to that question, 
that I made the remark incidentally which I did. 

Q. Then, is it part of your opinion that you desire now to express, that 
one of the causes of the fallacy that you observe, is due to the fact that it is 
attempted to transcend the limits of governmental authority ? 

A. Undoubtedly. I believe it is an invasion into the region of morals, 
where legislation cannot directly accomplish its purpose. Understand me, 
however, I do not think the limits of legislation to be so purely technical, as 
that they cannot touch moral subjects. On the contrary, I think the duty of 
legislation is to promote them as far as possible. Indeed, it is one of the 
foundation stones of our republic, the promotion of morality. But I do think 
that an attempt is here made to legislate against a universal (I do not know 
that I can call it by any better name,) appetite for stimulants in some form, 
(and I believe it is universal,) and an attempt to prohibit that by legislation, 
I believe to be one of the impracticable things which should not be attempted. 
I predicted eleven years ago that the people of the State would some day 
find it out ; and I am quite persuaded that the best minds that have addressed 
themselves to this subject, hold these views. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) As a matter of experience, has there been a 
change Avithin fifteen or twenty years, in the habits of people with regard to 
keeping liquors in houses and keeping it on the tables, so far as your observa- 
tion goes ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I should say there had been, within my observation, a change 

in respect to having wine upon the table. In respect to keeping liquors in 

people's houses, I now speak without reference to any particular class of 

society ; but with the people generally, I believe the change has been greatly 

5 



34 APPENDIX. 

for the worse. I believe more liquor is kept by the people of all classes 
(taking the average of our country,) in their houses, than was kept ten or 
twenty years ago. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Still there was a time, ten or twenty years ago, 
was there not, when it was a little disreputable to offer liquor to one's guests, 
in the ordinary range of society ? 

A. Well, sir, I know there has been something of that sort. I have in my 
mind, however, two occasions when I have happened to have at my house, as 
guests, two of your predecessors [speaking to Governor Andrew,] in the office 
of Governor of the Commonwealth, whose opinions were as well pronounced, 
perhaps, as those of any gentlemen in Massachusetts, and one of whom may 
be pronounced an apostle of temperance, as he was also the apostle of all good 
things — Governor Briggs. That must have been quite twenty years ago, and 
perhaps was about the time to which you refer. It was quite twenty years 
ago. I had been accustomed, when having guests at my table, to have a 
glass of wine on the table. I knew Governor Briggs' habits, and I knew his 
views upon the matter of temperance. He visited me ; but I still had my 
decanter of wine upon the table ; and I spoke of it. He said, " I should have 
a less good opinion of you than I now have, if you had put it away because I 
was to be your guest." At a period subsequent to that, Governor Boutwell 
was a guest of mine. I had a general party of citizens to meet him. I had a 
decanter of wine on my table as had been my custom, and as was the custom 
of society here. Governor Boutwell expressed substantially the same opinion ; 
saying he would be glad to convince me of the bad effect of using it at all ; 
but he would not have me depart from my social habits out of deference to 
him, because it would be (what I am afraid is very common in matters of this 
kind in Massachusetts) simply hypocrisy. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I would like to inquire your opinion, obtained in 
the administration of the criminal law, whether, when laws transcend the 
proper limit of legislation as far as you have expressed the opinion that this 
does, such laws can, as a rule, be executed to any good purpose ? 

A. Well, my dear sir, that is a question upon which I can give no light, 
to a Committee so intelligent as this. All history teaches us that it cannot. 
It is apparent in the legislation, and actual social condition of the different 
people of the world, as any fact which there can be, it seems to me. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) The reason of my asking was, that we are hearing 
it expressed that just at the present time this prohibitory law is on the right 
course and being executed, and is going to be perfectly executed. Do you 
believe it possible, from your knowledge of criminal law ? 

A. If I did believe it possible, I should say, God speed the work. If I 
believed it would improve the morals of Massachusetts ; if it would serve as a 
shield to my boys, who are growing up, from the possible temptations which 
they may meet, I would certainly find myself in the ranks of those who are 
urging it to its most efficient execution. But I am very well persuaded that 
it is only a step in the wrong direction. And from the fact, as I believe, 
that it tends to increase the evils of intemperance, I think it will have a 
tendency to destroy very much of what manliness there is among us, by the 
attempts to execute it. 



APPENDIX. 35 

Gov. Andrew, Mr. Chairman, lias had the goodness to refer me to my 
report to which I have made allusion, and which I have certainly not seen for 
a number of years. It is in House Document, No. 70, of the year 1 856. 

I have given the statistics in the previous part of the report of the costs to 
the Commonwealth. The total was $108,000 of taxed costs to the Common- 
wealth. I said, " These statistics, however, it should be added, furnish a 
very inadequate view of the expense to the Commonwealth, arising out of the 
efforts of the public officers to enforce the laws." 

But this is the paragraph to which I made special reference, as having been 
made the subject of reply : 

" In view of these facts, it is worthy of the serious consideration of the leg- 
islature, whether the results of these prosecutions, either in their reformatory, 
disciplinary or punitive aspects, have been at all commensurate with the 
means and machinery which have been found necessary to be applied to them, 
in the existing state of public sentiment on the subject. My own deliberate 
judgment is, that it has proved an expensive failure ; and that new legislation 
is required, to meet the enormous evil which these statutes were hopefully 
designed to remedy. The character of that legislation, it is not my province 
or my purpose to discuss. It is undeniable, that the people of Massachusetts 
are earnestly desirous of doing, through the agency of the law, all that is 
practicable for government to do, by wise and considerate legislation, to 
arrest the progress of intemperance. But a system which utterly fails to 
accomplish this beneficent purpose, while it adds in so large a measure to the 
public burdens, cannot, with an intelligent and practical people, be a perma- 
nent and satisfactory one." 

These were the opinions which I entertained at that time, in a position 
where I had occasion to be very familiar with the operation of the law ; and 
I can only say, that I have not yet seen any occasion to change them. I 
wait, however, patiently and hopefully for some wiser man than myself to 
solve this problem. I think it is a very difficult one. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are not prepared to give any plan of legis- 
lation which you think would be a better one ? 

A. No, sir ; I should not feel prepared to do that at present. I should 
wish for more deliberation. I think the statement of witnesses on the stand, 
as to what they think is most desirable, is worth very little. 

Q. I should like to ask you if your recollection runs back to the time when 
licenses were prevalent in this State, and if you recollect their operation ? 

A. I can go back in my early practice as an attorney at law, to this state 
of things. Licenses were granted upon recommendation of the selectmen of a 
town, by the Court of General Sessions, the predecessors of the Court of County 
Commissioners. Among the earliest retainers which I had, was a class of per- 
sons, asking for a license, who wanted the approbation of the selectmen, and 
then going to the Court of General Sessions for a license. I can remember 
very distinctly three or four persons, very respectable men, as respectable 
men as any in the city where I live, (New Bedford,) who Were grocers, and 
who retained me not only for the purpose of getting a license for them, but to 
resist the licensing of others, upon the ground that they would not conform 
to the existing regulations, and therefore should not have a license. In other 



36 APPENDIX. 

words, the parties who retained me, did so to keep improper persons from 
getting a license. I have repeatedly been to Taunton, the county town, with 
a list of the applications of those whom I was to resist in order to prevent 
improper persons from being licensed. That is my earliest experience. Long 
after I came into the office of District Attorney, qualified licenses were 
granted, but the principal part of my practice was under a system when no 
licenses were granted. I was appointed to that office in 1839. 

Q. Your memory goes back of that to a little extent ? 

A. Yes, sir. I came to the bar in 1830. 

Q. I should like to ask whether, when they gave licenses in the towns and 
cities, they did not give so many that anybody could be supplied with- 
out inconvenience, or whether they were so few that it was inconvenient and 
operated as a restraint upon the traffic ? 

A. I imagine the purpose was, to make a convenient access to the purchase 
for the entire community. That is to say, according to my recollection I 
should think that in the city of New Bedford which might contain a popu- 
lation, at that time, of twelve or fifteen thousand inhabitants, the number of 
persons licensed to retail would be about five or six. A great many appli- 
cations used to be made under the old law for a license. Under that law the 
selling to certain persons was forbidden. If one sold to a person after the 
seller had been notified that the person used it to excess, his license was abro- 
gated. It was not an unfrequent thing for the grocers at that time to make 
complaints to the Court of Sessions, desiring to have the license of A. B., for 
instance, revoked, because he did not conform to the regulations. 

Q. Were they ever revoked ? 

A. Oh, I imagine so; I would not undertake to say. Undoubtedly there 
were cases of revocation. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) As a matter of practice, did the better men get 
the licenses to the exclusion of the others ? 

A . Undoubtedly, sir. I have in my mind now two or three persons who 
in subsequent years were among the most respectable men in New Bedford, 
founders of families there, who were at that time licensed grocers. One of 
them is now a conspicuous philanthropist and reformer. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Did not persons use to sell without a license to a 
considerable extent ? Do you remember how that was ? 

A. I do not think there were many. I think they were pretty sharp to 
see a man who did not have a license. Those grocers would be pretty apt to 
look sharply after a person who were attempting to sell without license. My 
experience perhaps, ought to be taken with reference to the community in 
which I lived. It may have been exceptional. We were a Quaker commu- 
nity at the period of which I speak. The predominant influence was that of 
the Society of Friends. And although it was a considerable sea-port, with a 
large foreign tonnage, and carrying on a most extensive whale fishery, still it 
was an exceedingly orderly town. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) As an average, was the class of retail dealers 
superior in point of character to those who sell liquor now ? 

A. Why, my dear sir, it would be quite unjust to them to institute a com- 
parison. It is very much of a contrast. Of course a contraband and prohib- 



APPENDIX. 37 

ited traffic brings in, to participate in its profits, a very different class of men 
from those engaged in a legitimate traffic. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you mean to say that the character of the 
traffic has particularly changed here in Boston for the last twenty years ? 
Do you mean that it is in worse hands in Boston now than twenty years ago ? 

A . I do not know what to say of that class which I had particularly in 
mind in Boston. I suppose in the departments of hotel-keeping and dealers 
in wines, and importers, there has not been ; but I should be surprised to find 
that there had not been a change and a very marked deterioration in those who 
have sold liquor in Boston. I do not know how the fact is, but from my 
observation in my section of the State, I should say it was marked and 
distinct. 

Q. You spoke of your experience as Attorney-General, and that the 
results were not commensurate with the general expectations ? 

A. The law was conceived in insincerity. I happened to be the law- 
officer of the governor at the time that law was passed in 1852. I was Gov- 
ernor Boutwell's Attorney General. Very erroneously, his course upon the 
subject of that bill was attributed to me. He had no conference with me 
whatever. His first veto and subsequent signing of the bill were entirely his 
own. At the time of the enactment I happened to be here in Boston, and 
there were three gentlemen who were my fellow lodgers at the Tremont 
House. All three voted for that bill, and after its passage they came down 
to the Tremont House and celebrated their vote for the Maine Liquor Law, as 
it was called, with a hot whiskey punch for all three of them. I do not think 
I am prudish in such matters, but I confess that I was shocked, and I expressed 
my feelings pretty strongly. One of them said to me, (a man of no little distinc- 
tion,) " Oh, this law will never be executed ; it is a mere sop to Cerberus." 
Said I, you have voted for this law upon your oaths, and you ought not to 
vote for it unless you believed that it was to be a law which could and ought 
to be carried into effect. 

Q. I think you were quite right as to your opinion and as to duty. I 
should like to ask you what, during the period of your administration as law 
officer of the Commonwealth, was the position held by the several cities of 
the Commonwealth, and particularly Boston, in regard to the administration 
of the law. You speak of a large expenditure and incommensurate results. 
I should like to ask what was the influence of the authorities to whom was 
committed the execution of the law, and particularly in Boston ? 

A. I think the feeling was more antagonistic al to the spirit and execution 
of the law in Boston, than in any other part of the State. But I think it was 
equally true, in a proportionate degree, in the large towns everywhere. 
There was no difficulty at all in suppressing the traffic in the smaller towns, 
within my experience as a prosecuting officer. 

Q. Do you think there was any sincere intention, or any real persistent 
effort to execute the law in the city of Boston, so far as you could officially 
judge ? 

A. Yes, I think there was. I cannot speak of Boston particularly. I do 
not feel sufficiently well advised as to that. I know that, in conference with 
public officers, having in some degree the responsibility and direction of these 



38 APPENDIX. 

matters, it was determined that there should be a fair effort made to execute 
the law ; not with confidence that it would succeed. We all understand that 
that impairs very much the character of the effort. A hopeless task is not 
likely to be very earnestly pursued. 

Q. Did that effort ever go so far in Boston as to exclude from the jury 
box men who were engaged in the liquor traffic ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. In your experence as a prosecuting attorney, or as attorney general, 
could you reasonably infer that any criminal of any class would be likely to 
find his fellow-criminals guilty ? 

A. I have an opinion on that subject that may surprise you somewhat. 
When I was a prosecuting officer, I used to feel a good deal of assurance that, 
if I could have a rumseller on the jury, I should carry my efforts through to 
conviction. I always felt that it was rather a help in a case. I always knew, 
if I had one who was obnoxious to prosecution, he would be a help, because, 
if there was a failure to convict, he knew very well that he would be singled 
out as the party who was opposed to a conviction by failure of the jury to 
agree. I have known notorious rumsellers, who would bring in a verdict of 
guilty, and seemed to have no sort of compassion for their associates. 

Q. Do you think that has been the general opinion in the Suffolk cases ? 

A . No, sir ; I do not. But I do not think that the indisposition was con- 
fined to those directly engaged in the traffic. I think it expended to a large 
class of men. I think that many men would reason thus : that they could 
not conscientiously refuse to convict on many other occasions, and that they 
would be as strict in this matter as in others. 

Q. Do you regard alcohol, in any form, as fitted to repair the waste of 
nervous energy ? 

A . I do, decidedly. 

Q. Are you familiar with the opinion of Dr. Carpenter ? 

A. I am, somewhat. I do not think there is a treatise on the subject that 
I have not at some time examined. 

Q. Are you prepared to controvert that opinion ? 

A . I am not called upon to controvert any proposition which is as yet a 
subject of controversy among those most competent to discuss it. It is an 
open question, as I understand it, each side of which has its advocates, 
whether, under any circumstances, the nerves are injured under the exhaus- 
tion from the use of intoxicating drinks. 

Q. But is it not a fact, that some of the first scientific empiricists of 
France have shown by actual experiment that there can be found in the 
tissues of the body only the most minute trace of nutritive substance derived 
from alcoholic liquor ? 

A. I think you must excuse me. I submit to the Committee whether I am 
to carry on a physiological discussion upon so remote a point as that. If I 
have given any opinion, the value of which you think would be effected by 
my opinion on physiology, I certainly will reply to you on that subject. I 
am not an expert, Mr. Miner, on this subject, and should not think that 
any opinion that I had was worth any more than those of the Committee. 
And, besides, I have no great faith in medical demonstrations. 



APPENDIX. 39 

Q. I should like to ask you one question. You spoke of the govern- 
ment's transcending, in our present prohibitory law, proper governmental 
power. I would like to understand how you discriminate ? If the govern- 
ment has a right to prohibit ninety-nine men in a hundred, though it be by a 
license law, how does it transcend its power by prohibiting the hundredth ? 

A. I think the same reply is applicable to that interrogatory that would 
be applicable to the question, if you should put it to me, By what right does 
the legislature deprive a young man of twenty years and eleven months 
of age of the right of suffrage, when it gives it to him who is twenty-one 
years of age ? The theory of government, I suppose, to be that, by organi- 
zation and association, it shall, with the materials that human nature and 
society present, accomplish the best good possible and practicable. 

Q. I understand you that the present law transcends governmental 
authority ; but that, notwithstanding any opinion that you have, if the pro- 
hibitory law could be executed, you would bid it a hearty God speed ? 

A. I beg your pardon, sir ; I only said, that if it could accomplish the 
results which are claimed for it, and for which it was enacted, and would 
result in the reformation of the community and the preventing of the use of 
spirits to excess, I would bid it God speed. 

Q. Which of these points did the law aim at ? 

A. I imagine that it aimed at both, sir. 

Testimony of Hon. George B. Upton. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) May I ask you, sir, how long you have been a 
citizen of Massachusetts ? 

A. Something like sixty years, sir, I think. 

Q. You were born here ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you always lived in Boston ? 

A. No, sir ; I lived many years in Nantucket. 

Q. How long in Boston ? 

A. Some five and twenty years. 

Q. You have been engaged in navigation ? 

A. Yes, sir; I have been engaged in navigation for many years. 

Q. Your name is appended to one of the petitions, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now, without any specific interrogatories, I would be glad to know 
what your opinion is as to the effect of the existing legislation upon the tem- 
perance and good order of the community ? 

A. My own impression is, that all prohibitory law upon the subject of 
liquor-selling — that is, an extreme prohibitory law, that liquor should not be 
sold at all, — is bad law. The moment you tell a man he shall not do a 
thing, he will be sure to do it ; but you may ask him not to do it, and he will 
listen to it. That is my opinion on that subject. We have appetites which 
we have inherited, I suppose, from Lot downwards. They exist within us, 
and for that reason they have to be controlled rather by moral influence than 
by legislation. I signed the petition, believing that a well regulated law 
would be better than to undertake to carry out a prohibitory law. It would 



40 APPENDIX. 

seem to me that, so far as our public houses are concerned, they should be 
allowed to give the ordinary entertainment to travellers ; and, so far, perhaps, 
as eating-houses are concerned, that they should furnish their customers with 
what is usual and ordinary. My own impression is, that I should not license 
anybody to keep an open bar. That would be my opinion from what expe- 
rience I have had. 

Perhaps my views upon the sale of liquor are peculiar. I have heard 
persons rail at bad wine, and bad brandy, and bad gin. But I call it good 
wine, and good brandy, and good gin, but bad individual. You have to 
reach the individual. I don't know that I can enlighten the Committee upon 
the subject. I think there is a great deal of (if I may say) dissipation. I 
know that many years ago I happened to be in the city when the subject of 
temperance was being agitated ; and I remember that the surgeons of the 
Massachusetts General Hospital published a statement, saying that wines and 
alcoholic liquors were never necessary, either for medicinal purposes or the 
uses of life. I went one day to the Massachusetts General Hospital, and 
while I was there, there was a tray brought in with some decanters upon it, 
and I had the curiosity to ask what was in them. Some of the gentlemen 
who had signed the statement that alcoholic stimulants were unnecessary, drank 
from the contents of these decanters. I was informed that in the decanters 
were rum and gin. It would seem, therefore, that, although some distin- 
guished physicians had stated that alcoholic stimulants were not necessary, 
yet, when it came to ordinary practice, they were used in that way. I 
therefore considered that, on the whole, some stimulants were necessary, and 
that those were the most simple form of stimulants which could be used. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) When was it that the surgeons of the Massa- 
chusetts Hospital gave that opinion ? 

A. I should think it was something like five-and-twenty years ago. 

Q. Are you not mistaken in saying that they said that alcoholic liquors 
are never necessary as a medicine ? 

A. I have understood it so. 

Q. I have no knowledge that anybody ever did that. 

A. I know they have ; I know that such a certificate was signed, when I 
resided on the island of Nantucket, by all the physicians there, stating that it 
was unnecessary as a medicine, because I know that one of them sent to my 
house for a glass of wine for medicine, and I told him not to do it again, or I 
should insult him, for he had stated that he considered it was immoral to use 
it, and I did not want him to consider me guilty of immorality in that form. 

Q. An express provision. of this law is that liquors may be sold for 
medicinal purposes. You say that, owing to the natural indisposition of men 
to be controlled, if you forbid men to do a thing they will do it because they 
are forbid ? 

A . I say it is pretty apt to create that feeling. 

Q. Yes, I know that feeling exists in Yankees ; but does it operate so with 
regard to lotteries and gambling because they are forbid by law ? 

A. I am not familiar with those two subjects, but my own opinion is that 
there is a good deal of lottery-ticket selling and a good deal of gambling. I 
know but little about it. 



APPENDIX. 41 

Q. Your memory goes back to the time when lotteries were licensed ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. And when they had their schemes advertised on placards almost 
everywhere ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And when lotteries were even got up to build churches ? 

A. Oh, yes, sir. 

Q. And perhaps you recollect that on one occasion a man by the name of 
Acres, in a store of James Reed & Co., abstracted funds to the amount of 
some twenty thousand dollars, and spent that money in lotteries, and then 
committed suicide, and that a law was passed entirely forbidding lotteries ? 
Have you any idea there was a tenth part of the money spent in lotteries in 
the ten years after that there was in the ten years just preceding that ? 

A. Probably not, for the reason that lotteries were previously used as 
schemes for carrying out particular purposes. You could sell tickets as well 
now if the law allowed it. 

[The continuance of this kind of questioning was here objected to by the 
counsel of the petitioners, and ruled to be irrelevant to the subject-matter 
before the Committee, and inadmissible.] 

Q. I would like to ask the witness one further question. He has given 
the opinion that when men are prohibited from doing a certain thing they are 
determined to do it. Why will not a license law operate in the same way, 
in so far as it is a prohibitory law ? 

A. You leave the question open. A license law is not a prohibitory law. 

Q. But you do not suppose the whole community is to be licensed ? 

A. No, sir. I would state the question in this way : one side of the ques- 
tion would be that you leave the question open for a man to be a temperance 
man or not ; the other side is, that a man shall not be a temperance man, but 
a total abstinence man. 

Q. You would not deny that the ninety-nine men out of the hundred are 
forbidden, would you ? 

A. No, sir ; the ninety-nine men are prohibited from it certainly. 

Q. Then the objection would be against the ninety-nine, would it not ? 

A. No, sir ; because these men have a right to buy themselves. It applies 
to the law, and not to the buying and selling. 

Testimony of Hon. Joel Parker. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Will you be kind enough to inform me how 
long you have been a student, practitioner, and teacher of law ? 

A. Something more than half a century. 

Q. How long were you on the bench of the supreme court of New Hamp- 
shire ? 

A. Fifteen years. 

Q. And for several years have been professor of law in Harvard College ? 

A, Nineteen years. 

Q. I would be glad if you would state to the Committee how far you have 
considered the subject of the existing legislation of Massachusetts upon the 



42 APPENDIX. 

subject of the sale of spirituous and fermented liquor, in its relations to the 
limits of legislation, regarded as a scientific question ? 

A. Well, sir, I do not know that I can say I have considered it particu- 
larly with reference to any details of legislation. As a general subject, it has 
been before me, as it has been before the rest of the community ; and I have 
formed an opinion in relation to it, perhaps in general, but not with reference 
to particular details of legislation. 

Q. That opinion may be more useful to us than if it were detailed. 

A. Well, sir, my opinion, in a general way, is shown by the fact that I 
signed one of the petitions which I suppose is before the legislature, though 
I was not aware when I signed the petition that I should be called upon to 
give my opinion in any other way. That expression of opinion was, that a 
license law was desirable, under the existing state of things. 

Q. Any opinions and views upon that subject, which you may be prepared 
to express, I think the Committee will be happy to receive ? 

A. I am sorry to say that I cannot claim to be an expert ; and therefore 
my opinions are not likely to be of any great use to the Committee or legis- 
lature. My opinion has been that the prohibitory law could not be executed 
for any great length of time; that it could not be executed thoroughly 
throughout the community at any time ; that if it was executed to a consid- 
erable extent, to that same extent the opposition to it would probably increase 
in the minds of men, until it would be overturned ; that the attempt to exe- 
cute a prohibitory law, was opposed to that principle of human nature which 
craves excitement in some shape or form ; that that principle would lead men 
to insist upon something which would give that excitement ; that if it was not 
liquor it would be something else ; that human nature could not be re-cast in 
such a way as that that principle would be extinguished, and that it would 
overcome any prohibitory law which would be passed, after a time; that 
though the law might exist for a period and be executed to a considerable 
extent, yet it never would eradicate the evil ; and that in sohie respects the 
effects of the sale would be worse when the attempt was made to prohibit the 
sale entirely, than it would be if its sale were admitted under restrictions ; 
and that another evil which existed was that while the sale would exist under 
a prohibitory law, the tendency of the sale under such circumstances was to 
corrupt the morals of community to the extent to which the sale existed, 
rather than promote them. Another objection against the prohibitory law, it 
seemed to me, was its tendency to corrupt the community by making it a 
political question, which it is not, in its legitimate bearings, and by subject- 
ing candidates for office to catechism on their opinions on that subject, and 
rejecting or electing them, not according to their fitness otherwise, — not 
according to their intelligence, — not according to their capacity to serve the 
State in the general business of legislation, but according to their opinions on 
this subject; if they were not qualified on this subject they were not qualified 
at all, and if they were qualified on this question, they were qualified on other 
matters. Difference of opinion on that point would corrupt the candidates 
and corrupt the electors. I have thought, from considerations of that char- 
acter, it was desirable to allow and regulate what could not be suppressed for 



APPENDIX. 43 

any great length of time, rather than to have guilt prevailing in the commu- 
nity from attempting to enforce what was impracticable. 

Q. Do you think the history of legislation tends to show that it is possible 
to make people temperate by Act of Parliament, by a legislative Act ? Does 
or does not, in your judgment, history show that the attempt to do so tends to 
diminish moral influences ? 

A. Perhaps I should say that my answer would depend upon the signifi- 
cation you give to the word " temperate." I have no doubt that legislation 
may, to a certain extent, prevent the use of alcoholic liquors. If you mean 
by temperance that legislation may tend to prevent the use, I should say that 
it might ; but if you mean by temperance that the tendency of legislation is 
to prevent drunkenness, I should say that it might for a time perhaps. But 
if, as I suppose, the people will break over a prohibitory law, after a time, I 
should think it would be worse. We are prone to go to extremes ; and when 
we get to one, the pendulum swings to the other, very likely. 

Q. What would be the effect of removing numerous places of sale, in 
regard to removing the appetite for liquors, out of which drunkenness springs ? 

A. I cannot say that it would; in fact, I think it would not have any 
great effect one way or the other. I do not think it depends upon that. It 
might to some extent, however ; because if there were numerous places where 
it could be had, the observation of one person seeing persons drinking might 
excite his appetite, whereas he might not if he had no occasion to see 
anything of the kind. 

Q. Suppose prohibition were to be made operative, as you judge it might 
be for a time, to a considerable extent, what would be the tendency, in your 
judgment, during that period, in regard to the probable condition of the pub- 
lic mind in regard to the use of liquors ? Would you be likely to find as strong 
and prevailing an appetite as existed before ? 

A. Well, I could not answer that with any assurance that I could speak of 
it any better than anybody else does. Regarding this as I do, as connected 
with the principle of human nature, that the system requires excitement of 
some kind, and that if it does not have it in that way it might resort to opium 
or other stimulants, so that the effect would not be very materially changed. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you think innocent amusements could be made, 
to any extent, to take the place of alcoholic excitement, and so obviate the 
demand for that ? 

A . I would say that I think they would, to some extent, but not to the 
extent of causing a cessation of the appetite. 

Q. Does the use of liquors tend to increase, by a pretty steady law, the 
strength of the appetite ? 

A. In some instances it does, and in some it does not, probably. That 
depends upon the constitution of the individual, I think, rather than on any 
general law. 

Q. Would you think it would be pretty safe to assume that as a general law ? 

A . I do not think that you could assume anything better, perhaps ; I 
should not say that you could. In relation to expressing opinions, as I am 
called to do to-day, I may say that I have a very distinct recollection of the 
early initiation of the temperance movement in the city in which I then 



44 APPENDIX. 

resided. The constitution proposed for the society was one by which the 
members agreed to abstain entirely from the use of all beverages that could 
intoxicate, (I do not recollect the precise phraseology,) and the objection 
which was made to that, when the society came to consider the constitution, 
was that it went too far. I had occasion to say that I was willing to abstain 
from all ardent spirits, and that I would not offer them to any in my employ, 
but that I was not willing to go further and engage that I would not use, or 
offer to others wine, cider, or beer, because I did not think it was politic to 
attempt so much. 

Q. And that has been your opinion until the present time ? 

A. Perhaps I should want to put it in a modified form, but I do not know 
that I have changed my opinion. The society was formed on that basis. It 
was objected that the society could not stand on that basis, because, it was 
said, the rich could procure wine and the poor could not ; and we were met 
with the objection that we were inconsistent. I said in answer to that, I am 
not pressed with that objection. If the poor man cannot get wine, he can get 
cider or beer. The observation that I made at that time was, that I never 
knew a man to become a drunkard on cider alone. If, however, he uses alco- 
holic liquors also, he may. 

Q. Have you ever known one to perpetuate his inebriety by cider alone ? 

A . I have no doubt he might do that. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Will you state whether or not in your judgment 
the theory of prohibitory law rests upon the postulate that drinking alcoholic 
liquors, as a beverage, is, under all circumstances, a sin ? I exclude medical 
uses of it, of course. 

A. With some persons it does, of course. I do not know whether it does 
with all persons. 

Q. Whether, as a theory of law, it could be supported on any other postu- 
late, except that drinking, under all circumstances, is a sin ? That is, the 
argument would be : to drink is a sin ; to buy to drink is a sin ; to sell to drink 
is a sin ; we will punish for selling to drink ; and we will not punish for 
buying to drink, nor for drinking in itself. 

A. If a prohibitory law could be executed so as entirely to prevent drunk- 
enness, without any evil to the commuuity from the absence of the means of 
drunkenness, I am not prepared to say that a prohibitory law might not be a 
subject of legislation, without regarding it as especially sinful. The general 
ground upon which it is attempted to be maintained is, that it is sinful in 
itself. That is the doctrine of a great many persons. 

Q. Is not the difficulty in the execution of the prohibitory law radically 
dependent upon the conviction in the minds of the community that the 
drinking itself is not a sin ; that the buying is not a sin ; and that, if it is not 
sinful to buy, it is not sinful to sell ? 

A. I take it that is one difficulty ; I do not know that I could say that it is 
the difficulty. 

Q. (By Mr. Mixer.) I would like to ask Judge Parker if it is at all neces- 
sary to suppose or to assume that the drinking or the selling, perse, in a single 
instance, under all circumstances, is a sin, to justify a prohibitory law, any 
more than the laying of a tax to support charitable institutions demands the 
premise that not to give to an individual in a given case is a sin ? 



APPENDIX. 45 

A. I could not say, sir, that I think the two cases are alike. 

Q. I do not ask if they are alike ? 

A. It would depend, perhaps, upon the question whether I thought them 
alike. 

Q. We lay taxes to support certain poor, under some circumstances, as well 
as for other strictly charitable purposes. We cannot say it is a sin not to give 
to this particular applicant, and yet the State taxes my property and sells it at 
auction to pay that tax. Can that law be justified ? Does not the same pre- 
mise that justifies that law, namely, the public good, justify the prohibitory 
law? 

A. Perhaps you might say that the same reasoning would lead to the con- 
clusion that the prohibitory law was desirable, if you assume that the public 
good would thereby be promoted in the same way, as it would not. But you 
will understand that there is an objection to anything like sumptuary law. 
I should rest it on the public good. The foundation of the opinion which I 
expressed was, that the public good was not, on the whole, promoted by this 
law, and that it is not executed ; and, so far as it is executed, it is attended 
with certain evils which I have endeavored to indicate, and which spoils its 
effect. 

Q. Do you rest this opinion upon general principles of human nature, or 
upon your observation in relation to Boston for the last fifteen years ? 

A. My observation in relation to Boston, is nothing, except as that obser- 
vation is derived from the newspapers. 

Q. Have you given any special attention to the present aspect of the 
question, in relation to its execution ? 

A. Only in a general way, sir. 

Testimony of Charles Henry Parker. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you a native of Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. A member of the bar ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are an officer of the Suffolk Institution for Savings ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is your name appended to the petition for a license law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Without putting specific questions to you, I would like to have you 
state the grounds and the reasons upon which you favor some other than the 
existing legislation in regard to the sale of liquors ? 

Mr. Parker. I believe a license law can be executed, and that a pro- 
hibitory law cannot be executed. I think the prohibitory law has been fully 
tried, and failed to obtain the ends for which it was sought, and I am in favor 
of trying a license law to regulate the sale, and seeing what that will do. 
My position while in practice in the same office with my father, while he was 
a prosecuting attorney, brought me in contact with attempts to execute the 
law for some twelve or fifteen years. 

Q. How long ago ? 



46 APPENDIX. 

A. It was from 1835 down to 1852, or about that time. I was in the 
same office with my father, and personally acquainted with his attempts to 
practise under the law, and the attempts to execute it. 

Q. That covers the period of the " fifteen-gallon law " ? 

A. A portion of the time, sir. There were great efforts made at one 
time to see what could be done to enforce it ; and, I believe, every means 
were taken for the purpose. 

Q. Did not the city at one time refuse all licenses ? 

A. Yes, sir. They also undertook to make complaints under the law, 
and to enforce it. The Marshal (then Marshal Tukey) undertook to make 
complaints, and obtain evidence, and to aid in getting convictions. The 
result was, that, under the common-seller clause, it was almost impossible to 
convict. Exceptions were taken on one or two single counts, which went 
a good ways towards deferring the decision ; and in a vast majority of the 
cases, there were very few convictions under the common-seller indictments. 

Q. Has your position given you any particular opportunity of forming an 
opinion upon this point : whether the substantial execution of the law was 
such as to drive the traffic from the surface of society, and would it not appear 
in more dangerous forms in secret, furtive, and contraband trade ? 

A. That has undoubtedly been the result of the attempt to execute the 
prohibitory law. It is done now a vast deal under subterfuge ; there is a vast 
amount distilled in private stores, where previously it has not been. I have 
known instances of this kind ; and the result is, that the sale has been so open, 
and at the same time the extent of the sale has increased, in my opinion. 

Q. Your position in the savings bank gives you some means of observing 
the operation of this law among the poorer classes ? 

A. Yes ; I have had frequent requests not to pay out money where it has 
been under the control of the wife, because of its being used to buy liquor. 

Q. You have also had charge of a benevolent association, which has given 
you some knowledge on the subject ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been a member of the Boston Port Society whkh 
maintains Father Taylor ? 

A. Since 1839. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that you observed of the law from 1835 
to 1852 ? 

A. Yes, sir; during some part of that time. 

Q. Can you tell me what the law was during that period ? 

A. I think the " fifteen-gallon law " was in operation then. 

Q. How long was that in existence ? 

A. Some eight or ten years, I think. 

Q. Are you sure of that ? 

A. No, sir; I speak merely from impression. I speak particularly of the 
difficulty of enforcing the law, and in establishing the count for common 
seller, as being greater than establishing a single instance. 

Q'. From the repeal of that law, which was in the winter of 1840, up to 
1852, the period of which you speak, will you please tell me what the law was ? 



APPENDIX. 47 

A. Without looking at the statute book, I should not undertake to state 
it. The practice was to prove three instances of selling ; and there was also 
a penalty of twenty dollars, or more, for selling in a single instance. 

Q. Was there not a license law then ? \ 

A. I am not aware that there was. 

Q. Do you know how long it is since we have had a license law ? 

A. I do not. I remember that, under the old system, several years ago, 
there was a license law. 

Q. Do you remember how many they licensed in Boston when they had a 
license law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you know whether they suppressed the unlicensed sale at that 
time ? 

A. No, sir; I have no experience of that matter. 

Q. Under what law did they wish to suppress common sellers ? 

A. Under the law that existed at that time. 

Q. You expressed your opinion against the prohibitory law ? 

A. I did not base my opinion on that entirely. I based it on the 
attempt to enforce such laws as existed. And if the laws then existing could 
not be enforced, it amounts to still more if the stronger laws could not be 
enforced, where the penalty was imprisonment in addition to a fine for being 
a common seller, and where it is made a criminal offence. 

Q. Do you not remember that your father would get a very large number 
of indictments against the sellers in the city, and that they would come and 
plead guilty and pay their fines ? 

A . There was a vast number of cases where they paid their fines. But it was 
very difficult to get a conviction of a common seller, and it was impossible to 
try them all, as I have already said ; and they occupied the time of the court 
to such an extent that it was impossible to try them all. There were a vast 
number of cases where they were willing to plead guilty on the first and 
second count, and have that decision placed on file. 

Q. If I should tell you that I helped to find seventy-five cases in half an 
hour, under your father, and that all pleaded guilty, would you be surprised ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then what was the difficulty in enforcing the law ? 

A. They pleaded guilty in a vast number of cases on the single counts, 
but not under the common-seller count. 

Q. Do you remember the character of the law immediately previous to 
the fifteen-gallon law ? 

A.. No, sir ; it is not a matter that I have observed particularly. I am 
speaking merely of my observation. 

Q. Do you remember the substance of the law up to 1852 ? 

A. No, not in detail. 

Testimony of Lyman Nichols. 
Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are a cilizen of Boston ? 
A. Yes, sir. 
Q. You signed one of these petitions for a license law ? 



48 APPENDIX. 

A. I think I did, sir. 

Q. Have you had any opportunities of forming opinions of your own upon 
the different kinds of legislation upon the subject ? 

A. I should fully coincide with the opinions given yesterday by Governor 
Washburn, and to-day by Governor Clifford. I do not know that I have any- 
thing to add to them. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What is the ground of your opinion ? 

A. Well, I should say that the execution of a prohibitory law would be 
impossible in large cities. I think it could be executed in small towns. 

Q. Would it not do some good in small towns ? 

A . Well, I think it doubtful whether it would do any good there. I think 
they would send to the large places and get their supplies. 

Q. Do you mean to say that men will go in and get liquor when it is for 
sale on the other side of the street, when they would not send to Boston to 

get liquor. 

A. I never gave the subject much consideration, but from a casual view of 
the case, I should say they would get a large quantity, when perhaps they 
would go across the street and get a small quantity. I don't think the evil 
would be mitigated. 

Q. Why do you not want to prohibit the sale ? 

A. I think the use and sale of liquor is a great moral evil ; I think it can 
only be dealt with by using good moral judgment ; I think there is no other 
way to deal with it, except by a license law. 

Q. What kind of a license law would you have ? 

A. I have never given the subject any thought. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You convey the idea when you say if the shop 
was on the other side of the street he would drink a glass, whereas he would 
send to Boston if the shop was closed, that it is a less evil to have it near by, 
than to have it fifty miles away ? 

A. I think that people will have it. 

Q. You talk as if the freer the sale the less the use ? 

A. No, sir, I did not say that. 

Q. That is the idea you convey ? 

A. I say a man would go across the street, if he wanted to get it, whereas 
if he could not get it there he would send to Boston and get a large quantity. 
Therefore, to sum up, my opinion is that a proper and stringent license law 
would be the best way of dealing with it. 

Q. Therefore you say that the injury is less to get a small quantity than if 
he got a large quantity ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you advocate the license law in the interests ot 

temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir, I do. 

Q. You have taken a deep interest in the temperance cause ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Why then do you ask for a measure to prevent the traffic ? 

A. It is a question which has been the subject of considerable discussion, 
and my opinion was solicited by the presentation of a petition which I signed. 



APPENDIX. 49 

Q. But you were invited here ? 

A. I did not know anything about that till I saw the summons on my 
table. 

Q. But you wero told who wanted you ? 

A. No. 

Q. Were you told it was the temperance men who wanted you here ? 

A. It did not occur to me why I was summoned here until a gentleman 
rominded me that I had signed such a petition. 

Q. Did it ever occur to you as a singular fact, that the merchants of 
Boston want a law to restrict the sale, and that the dealers want a license law 
to permit them to sell ? 

A . I have not taken that matter into consideration. 

Adjourned. 



50 APPENDIX. 



THIRD DAY. 

Thursday, February 21, 1867. 

The Committee resumed its session at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of 
testimony was further continued. 

Testimony of Hon. George S. Hillard. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew). You have been in Boston many years, have you 
not? 

A. Yes, sir, a good many. 

Q. And been a member of the bar for a good many years also ? 

A. Yes, sir; upwards of thirty. 

Q. Have you, at any time in your life, travelled in Europe ? 

A. Yes, sir. I have been in Europe twice ; once in 1847 or '48, and again 
in 1859. 

Q. Have you had any opportunity of observing the effects of the native 
wines in the vine-growing countries there ? 

A. I answering that question, you will allow me to include more in my 
answer than is involved directly in the question. I have visited England, 
Scotland, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, France, a portion of Germany, a 
considerable portion of the Tyrol, and also Italy, and have had some means 
of observation which I have improved. In the first place, I will state, that it 
struck me as rather remarkable that water unmixed is hardly used as a bev- 
erage at all, in any of those countries, by what may be called the favored 
classes. In England and Scotland, ale and wine are consumed to a great extent 
by all persons in a certain rank of life ; that is, it is the daily and general 
rule. Take the members of the three learned professions, and including mer- 
chants, bankers, and tradesmen, and all persons above the condition of pov- 
erty, their common beverage is something else than water. Malt liquor is 
very much used ; and where there is a fortune it is wine. In the other 
countries, and especially in Belgium and Switzerland, wine is an article of 
daily consumption among all persons who can afford it. It is drank pure, but 
almost always with water. In every table d'hote, you see a bottle or half-bottle 
at every guest's table. As a general rule, it is drank mixed with water. But it 
is almost literally true, that you will never see a person drink a glass of water 
until you get to Rome, where the water is very good. In England, the water 
is very bad. Now I come to the question of intemperance. Intemperance is 
an evil in almost all the northern portions of Europe. But I think there is no 
country in which intemperance is so great an evil as it is in America. The 



APPENDIX. 51 

difficulty is, that that there is a peculiar tendency of the American mind and 
temperament to go to excess. It runs through everything. If we have a 
virtue, we are apt to push it to fanaticism. If a person does not drink strong 
drink, he insists upon it that everybody else must not. On the other hand, 
if a person drinks, he is apt to drink too much. It is an American trait. I 
was in Europe in 1859, and a very intelligent physician says to me, — " You 
Americans destroy your health by two things ; one is tobacco, and the other 
ardent spirits ; these are the two sources of disease in your country." One of 
the difficulties in our country is, that we drink ardent spirit, which is not, by 
any means, so much the case in Europe ; and in the next place, we have here 
a pernicious habit of drinking without eating, or dram-drinking. I should 
say, from my observation, that nine-tenths of the evil in this country from the 
use of liquor, arises from the habit of dram-drinking, where the effect of 
liquors, as every physiologist will tell you, is very much more injurious than 
when they are taken with food. Now, in all these countries of Europe, 
intemperance exists as a social evil mainly among the poor classes. In 
society, there is a great distinction between the favored and unfavored classes, 
the higher and lower ; and the great majority of the masses in Europe, are 
born to a condition of hopeless toil. The great trouble is, the great majority 
cannot get a good and sufficient supply of nutritious food. Of course, that is 
an evil that we do not have to contend with here. But our country is almost the 
only country where intemperance reaches to the favored classes ; while in 
Europe, it is very unusual for the clergyman, the doctor, the lawyer or the 
banker or the better classes of the society of the different countries to be sub- 
ject to the evils of intemperance. That is not unusual here. It is partly 
owing to the habits of the people generally, and the highly oxygenated social 
atmosphere in which we live. Those who have anything to do, are apt to have 
too much to do. The habit of taking liquor to such an extent, arises from the 
same tendency ; while on the other hand, drunkenness is almost unknown in 
Europe among the higher classes. I will take Scotland, where the religion is a 
most rigorous Calvinism, and where what we might call a Puritan severity is 
observed, and where Sundays are observed with the utmost strictness ; and I 
undertake to say, that the clergy of the Scotch church, men austerely virtu- 
ous, are, as a general rule, in the habit of drinking every day of either malt 
liquor or wine, or whiskey and water. The amount of liquor consumed in 
Scotland, in proportion to the number of individuals, is probably greater than 
in any other country of Europe. But the evils of intemperance in Scotland, 
are confined almost entirely to the lower classes. In France, Italy, and Ger- 
many, the difficulty with the poor people is that of want of proper food. The 
food is insufficient in quantity, and still more in quality. It is the habit with 
some of the laboring classes of Paris, to begin the day with a petit verve, or 
small glass of brandy. It is because they cannot get meat, and because the 
brandy supplies an artificial nervous energy which carries them through the 
day. But, as Prof. Liebig says, it draws upon the nervous system. I have 
remarked, elsewhere, that the people of Italy drink more than is good for 
them ; and it is because they cannot get good meat. Their food consists of 
vegetables and bread, and that which fills up and distends, but which do not 
constitute that food which gives the most of nervous energy. Let us suppose 



52 APPENDIX. 

that during the winter season (and oftentimes the winters in Italy are not by 
any means tropical,) a person should live on vegetables and bread only, and 
it will be found that there is an undeniable longing for something which shall 
give a nervous energy to the system. What is wanted is meat. If you give 
the man meat he will not want anything else. It would be a great 
improvement upon the condition of the poor in Europe, if they would 
eat more meat and drink less wine. So long as they cannot get meat, they 
will have wine. But there is this peculiarity, however ; you will hardly ever 
see a man intoxicated. And it is on the ground of sanitary advantages that I 
should urge a change in the drinking of little by little in order to supply ner- 
vous energy. I never saw but one man drunk in Italy ; that was on the Lago 
Maggiore. 

Q. Have you had occasion to consider how far legislative action in this 
country, is capable of controlling the American evil to which you allude ? 

A. Well, sir, I do not profess to have had any peculiar opportunities for 
observation ; nor is my opinion of any special weight upon that subject. I 
agree entirely with my friend, Mr. Spooner, and those who think as he does, 
as to the great evil of intemperance ; and I have a very great desire for the 
suppression of it. But, from my own observation in this community in which 
I live, it seems to me that the attempt to prohibit the sale of liquor is an 
entire failure, and that it produces some very distinct evils. I think it is a 
very great evil having a law on the statute-book that cannot be enforced ; 
because it confounds the moral distinctions in the minds of the people ; and 
because the habit of seeing a certain law neglected and set at naught, induces 
a moral habit which is not conducive to the enforcement of laws which ought 
to be enforced. Now, I will illustrate in another way. I have the honor at 
this moment, to hold an office under the United States. It is my duty to 
enforce the revenue and custom laws of our government. You can have no 
notion of the difficulties which are to be found in enforcing the laws which 
have grown up, some satisfactory and some unsatisfactory to the community. 
And it is because of the difficulty and almost impossibility in a country like 
ours, under free institutions, and where individual freedom is so much and so 
justly valued, of applying the rule of a most rigid supervision and what you 
may call tyrannical inspection. Take the article of whiskey, for instance. 
There is a tax of two dollars per gallon on whiskey, which (with great defer- 
ence to our legislators,) I pronounce a most unwise and injudicious law. 
And why ? Because you have a tax much greater than the value of the 
article. You have an immense temptation to everybody to evade the tax. 
And the consequence is that not more than one-third of the whiskey manu- 
factured in the country at this moment pays a duty. I should say that it was 
even less than that, or not more than one-fourth. And you can buy what is 
called whiskey for from $1.40 to SI. 50 in New York, the tax being at the 
same time $2.00. Every day whiskey is brought from New York to Boston 
which has not paid a tax. Our detectives are after it, but the law cannot be 
enforced. That is my illustration of the evil of having a law upon the stat- 
ute-book which cannot be enforced. If there was a tax of seventy-five cents, 
I believe the government would get more revenue from it, and there would 
not be the constant temptation to evasion. Another thing which is noticeable 



APPENDIX. 53 

is the quality of this whiskey ; it is detestable. The deleterious stuff that is 
brought here under the name and aspect and guise of whiskey, is injurious 
to health and unsafe. And it is, according to my idea, the direct result of 
having legislation that cannot be enforced. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you mean to say that the quality of whiskey is 
worse now than formerly ? 

A. I am told so; that is what I understand from the officers who are 
charged with enforcing the law. 

Q. Was it not generally understood that it was unsurpassably bad fifteen 
years ago, and has been ever since ? 

A. I cannot say as to that. I only speak now from my present point of 
observation. What they say of this illicit whiskey is that it is exceedingly 
bad. 

Q. If you were here under oath, would you say that it was bad ? 

A. I could not say that, because it does not come under my own experience. 

Q. I would like to ask you whether, in relation to your testimony touching 
the use of brandy, wines, ale, beer, and the like, partly because the poor lack 
food, you mean to be understood as saying that the liquors are cheaper than 
food? ' 

A. Cheaper than meat. 

Q. Do you mean to say that the nutrition and support obtained from the 
liquor is cheaper than the same amount of nutriment would be if the money 
were expended in meat ? 

A. Cheaper than as expended in meat. I said distinctly that they obtain, 
among the classes that I spoke of, a vegetable and farinaceous food, but that 
it was meat which was required to supply nervous energy. 

Q. I judged from the general tone of your testimony that drunkenness is 
not very prevalent in the countries of Europe. Drunkenness is to be found 
in every country in Europe. You refer to Scotland ; I think you do no 
injustice when you say that the poor of Scotland are extremely intemperate ? 

A. I cannot say from my own observation that it is so, but I think it is so. 

Q. Do you regard the regulations in the warmer countries such as to lead 
you to expect any change under the system you propose ? 

A. No, sir, perhaps not. 

Q, You speak of the use of liquors as drams, and the use of those liquors 
with food. From what point of view do you express an opinion on that 
subject. 

A. From a sanitary point. 

Q. From observation and experience ? 

A. From reading, not experience ; I am not a physician. 

Q. What do you infer from your experience ? 

A. I am not in the habit of dram-drinking ; I cannot say. 

Q. You distinguish between dram-drinking and drinking with food ? 

A. I distinguish between the use of wines or liquors at dinner with food, 
and drinking them upon an empty stomach. 

Q. You infer that the injury is greater in one case than the other ? 

A. I do not speak from experience; but I take it, that anybody who has 
read physiology, or has the slightest knowledge of the structure of the human 



54 APPENDIX. 

frame, knows that liquor taken alone into the stcmach has more' injury than 
when taken with food. 

Q. You speak of the favored classes in other countries, and of the poorer 
classes as being the victims of intemperance. What relation do the favored 
classes throughout Great Britain bear to the poor ? What proportion of the 
community falls under the deleterious influence of intemperance ? 

A. A large proportion fall under the head of lower or less favored classes, 
unquestionably ; the percentage I cannot say. 

Q. Should you say nine-tenth per cent. ? 

A. I should think not. '. 

Q. Can you give the number of landholders in England and Scotland ? 

A. I am unable to give the precise number. I think that five persons 
own one-fifth of the landed property of Scotland. It is perfectly well under- 
stood that the land in Great Britain is cultivated by men who do not own 
the soil ; and that the condition of the poor in Great Britain and Europe 
may be considered one of hopeless poverty. 

Q. As to the state of temperance throughout the great cities of England, 
what is your judgment ? 

A. I could not say positively, but if you ask me relatively, I should say 
that there had been a decided improvement since the beginning of this 
century. 

Q. From what causes ? 

A. From the increased amount of popular reading, the cultivation of a 
taste for cheap amusements, and a cultivation of a taste in art, etc. If you 
read the life of Lord Jeffrey, of Lord Coburn, and of Sir Walter Scott, you 
will see the great amount of drinking existing at the beginning of this cen- 
tury. And if you read a work 'written by a Mr. Shaw, you will find some 
curious statistics in reference to the amount of wine drank now at the 
various entertainments, dinners, etc. He says that two or three times as 
much wine used to be drank half a century ago as there is now. The light 
wines of Germany are now more used. I was in Europe in 1848, and again 
in 1859, and I have thought that there was less wine and liquor drank in 
1859 than at the time of my former visit. It may be a fancy. I have been 
told that in former times it was common for gentlemen to be flustered with 
drink at dinner parties, and such gatherings ; but I never saw a man at a 
dinner-party the least flustered. 

Q. You confine that remark to dinner-parties ? 

A. Yes, sir. And I never did see anybody in Scotland intoxicated; but 
I was there only three weeks. 

Q. You are aware that the places where gin and whiskey, etc., are sold in 
the great cities of Scotland are exceedingly numerous, as also in England ? 

A. Certainly; no one can doubt that. 

Q. Are you prepared to say that the state of things is worse here than in 
those cities ? 

A. I think you may say this : that among the laboring classes the standard 
of temperance is much higher here than it is there ; but I' think that among 
the educated classes it is the reverse. 

Q. And yet you have a regular system of licenses there ? 



APPENDIX. 55 

A. I suppose so. I do not suppose that any system will put an end to the 
use of liquor. 

Q. But you say the laboring classes get the worst of it ? 

A. I should say that among the laboring classes there was great injury 
done. In our own country they have more means ; and besides, they have 
hope. In the countries of Europe, the poorer classes of laborers have not 
this hope ; they are born to hopeless toil, and they drink for oblivion. 

Q. And you think that intemperance in this country is worse than it is in 
any other ? 

A. I should say so; for the reason, that it is found to a greater extend 
among the more favored classes — the higher classes, you may say, though thai 
is not the term to apply in our own country. You have met young men in 
your own experience, young men at college, young men with many advan- 
tages, socially and pecuniarily, who have become addicted to and been 
ruined by the use of intoxicating drinks. I mean that the effect is more 
noticeable in our own country upon that class of persons. 

Q. Are you sure that the difference between the effects upon the favored 
classes and upon the laboring classes would lie against the favored classes 
more than upon others ? Would they not about balance ? 

A. That is something that I cannot tell you : they are rather imponder- 
able elements. I should say, from my observation, that there was no country 
in the world which suffered so much from intemperance as America. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You have given your observation in Europe as 
to their wines and stronger drinks. Now, when Ave converse with a man 
about having prohibition in this country, he will say, Why, you go into 
Europe, and they drink their wines there, and there is no intoxication. Now, 
I want to ask you, if such a wine as the common wine of Italy exists in the 
country, in your opinion? Does anybody ever have it, uninforced by 
alcohol ? 

A. Oh, yes, sir. I think there is very little difference. Some of the 
wines of Italy are not very weak. There are various wines which are not so 
strong as those drank at the table d'hote. And the German wines are not very 
weak. 

Q. Are you not satisfied that no wine comes here in a pure state ? 

A. I presume that wine which is brought here is somewhat adulterated ; 
but I am sure that we can get the light wines of France, which contain less 
of an intoxicating element than the' wines drank in a considerable portion 
of Europe. 

Q. You spoke of no intemperance existing ? 

A . I consider that there is intemperance existing in some portions of those 
countries ; but I mean that there is comparatively little. 

Q. But it is pretty difficult for the traveller to see everything that is going 
on? 

A . You are perfectly right. 

Q. Do you suppose that, in this cold region, it is practicable to bring the 
light- wines of Europe into common use ? 



56 APPENDIX. 

A. I presume not ; it is too expensive. On the other hand, I consider 
that the introduction of lager beer into this country, especially in the West, 
as a substitute for whiskey, has been a decided improvement. 

Q. You sj)oke of the common habits of the laboring people in England. 
Is there not a good deal of drunkenness there ? 

A. To some extent, I have no doubt that among the laboring population 
of Great Britain there is a very considerable amount of drunkenness.; but I 
think it is very much less now than it was twenty-five or thirty years ago ; 
and it is because there has been so much done in England to elevate the 
condition of the laboring classes. 

Q. Another question. We came here on the petition of some gentlemen 
for a license law as a substitute for the prohibitory law, on the ground that it 
will promote temperance. Now you say that this prohibitory law is not 
enforced ? 

A. 1 speak of Boston. I do not know anything about the operation of it 
in other localities. 

Q. Are you conversant with the facts as to its operation at present, in 
Boston ? 

A. As I said before, I do not profess to have any particular means of 
observing. 

Q. Have you any knowledge of the operation of this law in the country ? 
You have been invited here to give testimony in regard to this matter. I 
want to know if you can give me an instance where a license ever served to 
restrain the sale ? 

A. No, sir, I do not know that I have. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I wish to ask if the practice of selling does not 
exist, according to your observation, abroad, at the present moment, without 
a license ? 

A. I cannot say that ; if it does it is owing, I think, to the excise. It is 
a clandestine manufacture, not a clandestine sale. 

Q. Can you suppose that drunkenness would be hid, if the walls of Paris 
were open to the free passage of liquor. 

A. No, sir ; I cannot say that. As I said before, I am certainly not such 
an optimist as to anticipate that, under any system whatever, drunkenness is to 
be suppressed altogether. 

Q. You are U. S. District-Attorney ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You have something to do with the prevention of smuggling, do you 
not? 

A. Yes, sir. I am afraid, however, that there is a good deal of smuggling, 
notwithstanding the efforts made to suppress it. 

Q. Do those who have to administer the revenue laws go on the principle 
that the more vigorous they are, and the more they do to suppress the traffic, 
the more evasion there will be ? 

A. I presume they do not, sir. It is my duty to enforce the laws of the 
land, as I am called upon to do, without regard to what I may think the 
effect of them may be. 



APPENDIX. 57 

Testimony of W. M. Lathrop. 
Q. (By Mr. Child.) Are you a resident of Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you one of the petitioners ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I simply wish to ask your opinion and belief, in regard to the two 
systems of legislation in regard to the sale of liquor, — the one a prohibitory 
system, and the other a system which restrains and licenses the sale. Which 
would be the best for the moral interests of the community ? 

A. Well, sir, I signed that petition because I considered the present law 
as failing to answer the end proposed by it ; and I think that a proper license 
law, which would regulate and control the sale in a measure, would be better 
for the community. 

Q. Have you any facts or observations in regard to the attempts to 
execute the portion of the law which relates to the seizure of liquor ? 

A . I happened to know of a case the other day. I have taken no special 
interest in this matter, and have had nothing to do about it. The case I 
allude to, was one where a man came to our office and wanted to get an 
insurance upon .a stock of liquors which he had stored the next door to his 
place of business ; and the reason he gave was that he apprehended a visit 
from the State Constable, and that he wanted to keep only a small stock on 
hand, and so replenish from his stock in the next building. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the general sentiment upon the qestion of 
a license law ? 

A. I think that the public sentiment is decidedly in favor of a license law, 
so far as I know. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What public sentiment do you speak of? 

A. I speak of the opinions of the people with whom I come in contact 
daily. 

Q. Where is your place of business ? 

A. It is in State Street. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You speak of a proper license system. Will 
you be so good as to give what you consider a proper system ? 

A. I have not digested that matter. I think that a license law that should 
authorize only a limited number of persons to sell would have a beneficial 
effect. 

Q. Have you had opportunities of judging of the operation of the liquor 
laws ? Has it been a matter of particular observation to with you ? 

A. I resided in New York some years, and I was connected with a tem- 
perance society there, and in that way came to know something about the 
operation of the law and the condition of things at that time. 

Q. Did they have a license law there at that time ? 

A. We had a license system there, but anybody that wanted a license, and 
would pay ten dollars, could have one. That was not such a law as I should 
wish to have. 

Q. What limit would you have to the granting of licenses ? 

A, I would have high prices for licenses. 

8 



58 APPENDIX. 

Q. How many should you think proper for Boston ? 

A. I am not prepared to say at all. I think the principal hotels should 
have a license ; and beyond that I think but few would be required. 

Q. Would you not license anybody to sell to families ? 

A. Yes, sir, I should. 

Q. Who, would you license ? 

A. If I was to mention any person I should mention yourself. 

Q. There are a good many grocers who are carrying on a respectable 
business ; would you not license them ? 

A. That would be making it too common. 

Q. There are some two hundred apothecaries, some of them conscientious 
men. Would you not license every one of them ? 

A. Well, I think they ought to be licensed. 

Q. You would not license respectable grocers ? 

A. I cannot say, sir. I should want to look over the city and examine the 
subject more than I have, before I could say as to that. 

Q. You have lived in New York ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you not know that every law they have had there has been a 
failure, and that it has always been a license law ? 

A . When I was in New York, I was connected with a temperance society 
there ; and when I was an officer I know that we did not consider the law of 
much consequence. But a considerable inroad was made upon intemperance 
during the few years that that society was in operation ; and I think a good 
impression was made. That society was broken up by the Washingtonians 
coming in ; and the societies, I believe, have not done much since then. 

Q. Did you not know that in the city of Boston, and in every city, wher- 
ever they have had a license system, they always licensed so many that the 
law was inoperative to any great extent, and everybody was permitted to sell 
without a license who pleased ? 

A. I was not familiar with Boston at that time, and I have not any opinion 
on the subject. 

Q. Have you continued your labors in Boston since you came from New 
York ? 

A. I have not come in contact with any temperence men in society since 
then. I have not been in favor of the system of legislation here, and have 
not thought it calculated to promote the cause. 

Q. Would you have a system which permitted everybody to sell ? 

A. We all understand, and the law understands, that alcohol is a necessity. 

Q. For what ? 

A. For medicine and for mechanical purposes. We admit it hy the law, 
and therefore the sale is permitted ; but, if it be confined to the purposes 
required by the law, I for one should be perfectly satisfied. 

Q. If you felt that this prohibitory law, as it is at present, would accomplish 
the results which you desire, you would give it your support, would you not ? 

A. I do not see in it any tendency to accomplish those results. 



APPENDIX. 59 

Testimony of Ex-Judge Henry W. Bishop. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Will you state what experience you have had with 
the laws relating to the sale of liquor ? 

A. My experience, sir, has been a very brief one indeed, and confined mainly 
to a very few subjects. When this prohibitory law was passed, I was in favor of 
it, though I doubted very much whether it would answer all the purposes that 
the friends and advocates of it desired. When indictments were found under 
it, I took pains to notice the number of indictments, because I was anxious to 
know something of the sale of liquor which was going on. And from time to 
time, for a space of about six years, I noticed that the indictments at the sev- 
eral terms of court that I held, were increasing ; and when I left the bench, 
the number of indictments was very much greater than at the time the law 
was put first in force. I came to the conclusion, therefore, that this law was 
not going to subserve the purposes desired by the advocates of it, and I 
regarded it as unsatisfactory. Another thing I noticed (and I do not know 
but that would apply to every law in relation to the sale of liquors,) was, that 
there was a great deal of perjury committed ; and another thing was, that 
upon examination of the liquors that were seized, it was found that there was 
a great deal of bad chemistry there. It is a very singular fact. My attention 
was called to it particularly, that even gentlemen of respectability, when 
called upon to testify in relation to the sale of liquor by their friends, or in 
relation to keeping public houses, they would conceal ; and there was a strong 
tendency, a very strong tendency indeed, to conceal and not disclose the 
truth : in other words, it afforded opportunity for committing, if it did not 
lead to the commission of the crime of perjury. 

Q. You have been at the bar a great many years ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. May I ask you if you have an opinion as a member of the bar and as a 
member of the court, that the enforcement of the law would check the sale of 
liquor ? 

A, Well, sir, I believe that, as long as men have nerves, they will require 
narcotics or stimulants, and that it will be very difficult to have perfect tem- 
perance, without tearing the nerves all out: and I judge in this way in rela- 
tion to that ; — that ever since the world was, men have got drunk ; and that 
as long as it lasts they will get drunk, although it is to be very much deplored. 

Q. From your experience in the position you have occupied, what has 
been your opinion as to practicability of so enforcing this law as to check 
materially the sale and use of liquor ? 

A. I think it will be very difficult indeed to enforce it. I think you will 
find great difficulty in enforcing this law, as long as ex-governors, ex- 
chancellors and ex-judges, and all the ex's are in the habit of drinking and 
purchasing liquor, to make the community believe as a mass, that it is a sin 
to sell it or drink it. 

Q. As a legal, judicial question, do you think the subject of restraining by 
law these gentlemen from the use of liquor is a • legitimate subject of 
legislation ? 

A. Well, sir, it would rather interfere with the judgment of men gen- 
erally. With regard to any dietetic or sanitary measures, you must instruct 



60 APPENDIX. 

men differently. It may be a very grave mistake that men were so con- 
structed. I have no doubt that by great exertion, all this propensity could be 
overcome to some extent, or made very much better. 

Q. From the action of courts and the hearing of the testimony of wit- 
nesses, what opinion would they give you as to the operation of this kind of 
legislation ? Is it not in accordance with the opinion of the courts generally, 
that the prohibitory law cannot be executed fully ? 

A. Excuse me, sir, from answering that question, for really, my opinion 
would be of very little value. 

Q So far as criminal law is concerned, does it not, if it is disregarded or 
unobserved, have an effect upon the general subject of respect for law ? A 
law not enforced, is not that injurious upon all other laws ? 

A. It affects all the other laws, and destroys the respect for the other 
laws, and they are yielded to reluctantly. 

Q. Again, I would ask you, supposing that the courts of the Common- 
wealth were employed all the time, and convicted a man every day, what 
effect that would have upon a traffic so extensive as this which they tell of 
having reached the amount of a hundred thousand dollars a day ? 

A. I think, sir, they would kick. 

Q. Do you believe it practicable, sir ? 

A. My oj>inion about it is that it is not practicable. I have noticed this : 
that in some localities the sale has been suppressed for a season, but only to 
break out again, and break out more violently. I know of two or three 
little villages in my own vicinity where the sale was suspended, but where it 
is carried on clandestinely, I have no doubt. 

Q. Are you able to give an opinion from your own observation as to the 
extent of drinking usages in Berkshire County prior to this law and at the 
present time ? 

A. My opinion is that in some places it is suppressed and that in others it 
is not ; and generally I do not think that the law has been of any great 
benefit. 

Q. Have you ever observed in regard to where it is not sold and where it 
is brought into town from other places ? 

A. I do not know as to that, sir. 

Q. I ask your opinion as a lawyer and a judge as to this feature : the 
law makes the sale of a glass of liquor a crime, and imposes a fine and impris- 
onment ; but the man who drinks is not found guilty of crime, provided he 
does not drink enough to get drunk. What is your judgment in regard to 
such a law ? 

A. I do not think it creates any great respect for the law itself. 

Q. Will you tell me why ? 

A. I will illustrate that point by an anecdote. While I was in the courts, 
a very shrewd man came to me one day and asked me* what was the penalty 
for stealing a glass of liquor. I informed him that it was twenty dollars fine 
and costs. He then asked me what was the penalty for selling a glass of liquor. 
I told him that penalty was a hundred dollars fine and costs, and he then 
asked me whether it was worse to sell a glass of liquor than it was to steal it. 
I simply give this instance to illustrate my views upon this point. 



APPENDIX. 61 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You speak of the non-enforcement of the law as 
injurious ? 

A. Well, sir, it certainly is, sir. 

Q. If you have a false principle, which is conceded to be such, enacted 
into a law, what would be the effect of such a law ? 

A. There would be no respect for such a law as that, and there ought not 
to be. 

Q. Do you claim that the protection of the sale of alcoholic liquors as 
beverages is for the public good ? 

A. I do not think I clearly understand you, sir. 

Q. I take it that a license law is a protected sale of liquor : the question 
now is, whether you think the sale of liquors is requisite to the public good ? 

A. I think, sir, that the sale of liquors should be circumscribed undoubt- 
edly. I would not give, by any means, all the persons in the community the 
right to traffic in it, as in oats, cheese and butter. 

Q. Do you regard the sale of liquors as requisite to the public good ? 

A. I confess I cannot understand what you mean by protected sale. 

Q. Protected in the sale of liquors means that the arm of the State is 
thrown around the trafficker, so that he shall not be harmed. Now is the pro- 
tected sale of liquors as a beverage requisite to the public good ? 

A. I think that a regulated sale of liquors is for the public good. 

Q. On which side would you have the power of the State; on the 
restricted side, or on the protective side ? 

A. You undoubtedly have your own idea distinctly in your own mind, 
but I frankly confess that I do not understand you. 

Q. A law that restricts many from selling and protects some, or a law 
which prohibits the sale altogether — on which side does the public good lie ? 

A. It lies, as all public good lies, in the protection. I would protect a 
person against any penalty for making sales of liquor if he is licensed, and if 
he brings himself within the conditions of the license. 

Q. You mean to say that the public good requires protection by law of 
men engaged in the sale of intoxicating liquor as a beverage ? 

A. Well, sir, you say I do. The Committee will understand me. I do 
not wish to avoid the question, but, not being familiar with metaphysical 
philosophy, as it is now more than fifty years since I pursued those studies at 
all, I confess I am not able to comprehend your idea of a protected sale. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) On what ground did you sign this petition for a 
license law ? 

A. On the ground that a license law would promote temperance. 

Q. Now I understood you to say that in the country in some places this 
law has done some good ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I have noticed it. 

Q. Is it not considerable ? 

A. I have no doubt that it is in many cases. 

Q. Your memory runs back to the day when we had a license law ; do 
you recollect that it restrained the sale of liquor ? 

A. I do not recollect that it ever did. There were a great many sales 
under that law by those who were not licensed. 



62 APPENDIX. 

Q. There -were so many licensed and so many unlicensed that it was no 
object to have a license, was it not ? 

A. There were a great many licensed. Up to the time that this law was 
passed there were licenses scattered all around. 

Q. Nobody was put to trouble when they were licensed, were they ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not know that they were. 

Q. What kind of a license law should you recommend ? 

A. I do not know what system I would adopt in relation to the license 
law. 

Q. Did there not use to be a good many sales by persons who had no 
licenses ? 

A. They have sold without licenses ever since I have know anything 
about business ; there have been sales without license, and sales in the face of 
prohibition. I do not know that the license law operated much different 
from this law in that respect ? 

Q. You say it is difficult to enforce the law, because men in official posi- 
tions drink ; have you ever known of any great reforms which have been 
started by ex-judges and ex-chancellors ; have they not always been started 
from a class of society lower down in the social scale, and have they not rode 
right over these ex-officials ? 

A. I believe that is generally the case, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I would ask if you mean to express an opinion 
that the application of the prohibitory principle tends to increase the traffic 
and thereby increase the number of indictments ? 

A. I did not say that, sir. I do not say that it has increased the traffic. 

Q. Why do you mention the greater number of indictments ? 

A. To show that the effects are not to suppress the traffic. I do not say 
that the traffic has increased, for that is a point that I do not know. I 
merely state this fact, and it is a fact which I have noticed particularly, that 
the indictments did not suppress the traffic ? 

Q. Do you believe that the conviction of the man whom you sentenced 
tended to increase or suppresss the traffic ? 

A. Well, I do not think it had much effect upon that one way or the 
other. 

Q. Do you think that the administration of the revenue- laws in this Com- 
monwealth has any effect upon those who pay taxes ? 

A. I do not know anything of the revenue laws, except as they reach me 
personally. 

Q. Do you believe it is proper to place in the jury-box a man who is 
himself a known violator of the same criminal law for which he is sitting in 
judgment upon another ? 

A. Well, sir, I should want to reflect a little upon that subject. I have 
known individuals of that character who were just as severe and just as 
strongly inclined to enforce the law as others are. I can recollect now par- 
ticularly one time when I was holding court (it was in Essex County,) that 
I was told that I should not get a conviction under the law, because two or 
three men on the jury sold liquor themselves. But I found afterwards that 
they were in favor of enforcing the law. 



APPENDIX. 63 

Q. As a principle you would not have counterfeiters upon the jury for 
the trial of a person accused of counterfeiting ? 

A. No, sir ; certainly not. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Is there any difficulty in Berkshire County in any- 
body's buying all the liquor that they want ? 

A. I think there may be some little difficulty about it, but this difficulty 
is overcome. 

Q. People obtain all they want ? 

A. They do. 

Testimony of Hon. E. B. Gillette. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you district-attorney of the Western 
District ? 

A. I am. 

Q. I desire you to state to the Committee any result of your professional 
or official experience at which you have arrived in the execution of the 
present prohibitory law ? 

A. My views may be a little unsettled, because my experience has been 
quite various, and especially so in the county of Hampden. I am prosecuting 
officer in Berkshire and Hampden Counties. At the last term of the court 
in Hampden County, there were some one hundred indictments returned, a 
large majority of which were against liquor-sellers. I was informed before I 
commenced the trials before the traverse juries, that there was not only a 
liquor-seller upon the jury, but one whom I had indicted at that term. I 
was also informed that I should secure no convictions before that jury, by 
parties whom I thought to be well instructed in the matter. 

Q. As a matter of fact, have you formed any opinion at any time, and 
have you any opinion now, touching the practical question of executing 
the law as it now stands ? I do not mean executing the men, but as to 
executing the law so as to accomplish a suppression of the traffic ? 

A. I think if the jury law was changed, giving the Commonwealth the 
right of challenge as well as the defendant, I should find no difficulty in 
executing the law against rum-sellers in my district. 

Q. That is, you would have no difficulty in convicting the men ? 

A. No difficulty at all. 

Q. Now, suppose you had a machine that would convict the men, would 
that fulfil the purpose of the law on temperance principles ? 

A. I think that temperance men, acting on temperance principles, stand 
aloof from this machine, not willing that it should do the work. I do not 
think any moral work can be done by any piece of machinery ; but I think 
that, as an auxiliary, it is very effective. 

Q. Have you seen or*known of many places where the traffic had been 
suppressed permanently and not spasmodically ? 

A. In the county of Berkshire, I think, there are soma towns where the 
traffic is pretty thoroughly suppressed. In the county of Hampden, I cannot 
recall now any town where it is suppressed. In my own town, to-day, (West- 
field,) there is less intoxicating liquor sold than there has been for a number 
of years. But there it has been done by a force entirely outside of any 



64 APPENDIX. 

law. There is an organization there called the Good Templars. They just 
go and pick out all the customers from the shops ; and they are shutting up 
their shops, as they are running every day at a loss, because their cus- 
tomers have been taken away by this temperance organization. So that 
there I do not think there is any very strong opinion expressed at present 
either for or against the prohibitory law, because they feel that the work 
is pretty effectually done by the organization. 

Q. Then, in your town, so far as there is any success, it is due directly to 
moral influences, and not to law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I understand that applies to your own town ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I understand you, that in Berkshire County the traffic is suppressed to 
a considerable extent ? 

A. At the last criminal term, there was quite a number of indictments 
found against rum-sellers. In almost every instance they came in, paid their 
fines and costs, and recognized that they would not violate the law. They 
paid into the treasury about twenty-five hundred dollars, and from quite a 
number of towns there was quite a strong expression of satisfaction from the 
temperance people, endorsing the law, under the constabulary administration 
of it. 

Q. Did the State Constables make the complaints mostly ? 

A. Yes. Before the constabulary law was passed, I should not have hesi- 
tated to say that I would prefer a license law to the prohibitory law. It was 
a dead letter. I think the constabulary law has been a very efficient one. 

Q. Then I understand that the Good Templars have suppressed the traffic 
in Westfield pretty much, but that in other towns it has been suppressed by 
the State Constables ? 

A. I am not aware of any town in Hampden County where the traffic is 
suppressed. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Is it as open as formerly ? 

A. I do not know. In Springfield and my own town, I think it is as open 
as ever. Although the traffic is diminished, the shops are open. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What has diminished it ? 

A. Many who have entered their recognizances in the courts, have agreed 
not to continue the traffic. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Would the Good Templars in your town work with 
the same good heart, without a prohibitory law as with it ? 

A. I have no opinion on the subject. 

Q. Do you think an open bar would be conducive to the public good ? 

A. No. 

Q. Do you feel clear on that point ? 

A. I do not believe that there can be a total prohibition of the sale of 
liquors. Take a city like Boston, although I should not advocate a single 
open bar in the city, at the same time I think in a city of this size, where peo- 
ple are coming from other States where there are different laws and different 
habits, to have a law so that at their hotel, where they consider a glass of wine 
as much a luxury as pastry or a desert, I should question whether there should 



APPENDIX. 65 

be or could be any such utter prohibition as to prevent all sale of it at the 
table or at the rooms. But I certainly should not vote for an open bar in the 
Commonwealth. 

Q. You mean that, like other social vices, it cannot be utterly eradicated ; 
yet in the rural towns an open bar would be adverse to the public good ? 

A. Yes, sir, I think so, anywhere. 

Q. And yet the claim of a resident of Westfield to the luxury of a glass 
would be as strong as the claim of anybody in Boston ? 

A. I look upon the drinking of a single glass of wine rather as a luxury 
than as a vice. There are many excellent people who do not think the 
drinking of a glass of wine involves any moral question. 

Q. Would you extend the same remark to a glass of brandy or whiskey ? 

A. I think that would depend upon the motive. I think a person might 
believe that a glass of brandy was, to him at least, as necessary as any luxury. 
Therefore it would not be an immoral act. 

Q. You spoke of the law as being dead previous to the State Constab- 
ulary law. What was the cause of that ? 

A. I think its inefficiency was the result of there being no persistent and 
systematic efforts on the part of temperance men. In one place there would 
be a spasm in its execution ; for a single term or two terms there would be 
prosecutions in order to suppress the traffic in a single village, and perhaps a 
majority of the prosecutions would emanate from a single village, so that one 
would think the traffic was stopped there, and in two or three terms after 
that it would have full swing there, and another village would be attended to. 

Q. If those who were responsible for the execution of the law had done 
what was necessary, is there any reason why the law would not have been a 
Jiving law as well as the constabulary law ? 

A. I see no reason in the world. 

Q. Then you speak of the death as attached to the officials and not to the 
law itself? 

A. I think the failure was because men who are strong in their temperance 
sentiments were willing to do their work by proxy. 

Q. Are you the prosecuting attorney of your district ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. Do you think it is the duty of any citizen to discharge the duties of 
the attorney ? 

A. No. 

Q. Why do you charge upon temperance men a want of the execution of 
the law ? 

A. I am not aware that it is the duty of the district attorney to prose- 
cute any offences except those which are brought to his notice by the citizens 
of the Commonwealth. 

Q. But there are other police constables and special police. Do you 
think it the duty of the citizens of Boston to discharge the duties charged 
upon the police ? 

A. I think it is the duty of all good men to see that the laws are enforced ; 
and if there is any failure on the part of any officials to do their duty, then I 
think the force of public opinion in any city or village, should be brought 
9 



6Q APPENDIX. 

to bear on the officials. I do not mean that any citizen should bring the 
prosecutions ; but in any village or town in my district, I do not think there 
has been any great pressure to urge the constables to do their duty, before 
the State Constabulary were in action. I think they folded their hands, and 
allowed the whole subject to drift. 

Q. Do you not recognize a manifest distinction between prosecutions for 
theft and prosecutions of houses of ill-fame ? In the prosecutions of cifences 
of this sort, do not the laws necessarily charge the prosecutions upon the 
public officers ? 

A. Yes, and I think the constabulary force has done the duty in my own 
district in a mode to entitle them to great credit. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) You say the law is not as well enforced in Hamp- 
den County as in Berkshire County. From what cause does this occur ? 

A. I will not say that. I say that at the last term, there was an utter 
failure in Hampden County, because there were men on the jury who refused 
to convict. We tried a number of cases, and at last the foreman informed 
the court that in no state of facts would the jury convict. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you think that is a state of things that the 
law ought to tolerate ? 

A. I think that if this law exists, there should co-exist, also, a law by 
which the Commonwealth should have the right to challenge as well as the 
defendant ? 

Q. "We are here on the petition of certain persons who favor a license 
law rather than the present prohibitory law, because it will promote the cause 
of temperance. Did you ever know, in this State, or anywhere else, that a 
license law restrained the traffic ? 

A. I cannot say that any such facts are within my knowledge. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Supposing a stranger goes into any of the towns 
in Hampden and Berkshire Counties. Could he buy liquor there ? 

A. From report, I should say that in Berkshire there were towns where 
it could not be bought. 

Q. Are these the larger or the smaller towns ? 

A. The smaller towns. 

Q. Take such places as Pittsfield, Stockbridge, Lenox or Great Barring- 
ton. Could a stranger buy liquor in such places ? 

A. I think he could achieve it. 

Q. Take the smaller towns ? 

A. I think there are some towns, both in Hampden and Berkshire 
Counties, where it could not be obtained without considerable circumlocution. 

Q. What is the proportion of towns in which it would be impossible to 
obtain liquor without circumlocution ? 

A. Very small. 

Q. In most places can liquor be obtained without difficulty ? 

A. I think it can. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) For how long a time have the efforts to carry out 
the law been genuine and persistent ? 



APPENDIX. 67 

A. I think the efforts on the part of the State Constables have been 
genuine. 

Q. How many have you in the two counties ? 

A. I cannot say. In Hampden County there are not more than two. 

Q. How many towns ? 

A. Some twenty. The execution of the law depends very much upon the 
character of the constable. In my county there is quite a firm-handed gentle- 
manly person, who, I think, is respected by the rumsellers and the temperance 
people ; and who has a certain sort of moral power, which is very efficient, 
aside from the dynamics of his office. 

Q. Are there many cases of conviction which are waiting sentence, pro- 
cured by the State Constables ? 

A. In Hampden County, the judge was obliged to dismiss one of the 
juries, because there was an utter failure to convict. There are very few 
cases of conviction, but there was a large number of cases where it was utterly 
impossible to secure conviction ; where the law proved utterly futile. 

Q. Through the character of the jury ? 

A. Yes. There were three or four persons on the jury, who would not 
convict under any state of evidence. I think that after that court adjourned, 
and as soon as it was understood that that was to be the result, there was a 
much larger sale, and a much more open sale in the county than before, and 
a very little restraint by the force of this law even. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you design to be understood, that you think 
there is anything so exceptional in reference to this description of legislation 
that the making of complaints ought to be left by the community to hired 
officers, instead of the individual citizens making complaints of facts coming 
within their knowledge ? 

A. No. I think the trouble with the law has always been, that citizens, 
either directly or indirectly, by themselves or by the medium of officers, have 
not interested themselves in its execution, but have felt that they had a 
machine. 

Q. Supposing that the men who are called temperance men especially, 
in your district, had interested themselves to convict those who are guilty of 
assault and battery, would there have been any necessity for the State 
Constables ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Then there is not the same feelings existing in the minds of the people 
as to moral responsibility on this subject, as with reference to others ? 

A. It did not exist on this subject ; but whether it did not have an influ- 
ence on other subjects, I am not prepared to say. 

Q. Is not every good citizen interested in suppressing drunkenness ? 
A. I think they are, in their sentiments. 

Testimony of Hon. Benj. W. Harris. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are now collector in the Second District ? 
A. I am. 

Q. Prior to your occupying that position, for how many years was you the 
District Attorney for the South-Eastern District ? 



68 APPENDIX. 

A. Eight years ; from July 1858 until July last year. 
Q. Be kind enough to give the Committee the results of your experience 
as District Attorney, in endeavoring to make practical and efficient the pres- 
ent liquor law. 

A. I came here in obedience to the call of the Chairman, to answer such 
questions and give such information as my experience might enable me to do. 
I do not come as an advocate of any law or system of law. I am prepared to 
give my experience with regard to the present law. For the last eight years, 
particularly the last three years, in the counties which composed my district, 
very earnest efforts were made to suppress the traffic in intoxicating liquors. 
The constabulary law gave me the assistance of some very efficient men ; and, 
during that part of the time, or since the constabulary law went into effect, 
something has been accomplished in the way of closing up the respectable 
liquor shops, if you can apply that term to them, particularly in the town of 
Dorchester. There, two of the principal hotels were closed entirely, as we 
supposed, by the assistance of the State Constables, aided by the Board of 
Selectmen of that town. But I do not ^now whether, upon the whole, there is 
less liquor sold in the county of Norfolk to-day than before. It is not sold in 
the same places. I have found some difficulties in that law which I would 
like to state to the Committee. The law calls upon the prosecuting officer to 
move for the punishment of every person convicted of the crime of being a 
common seller of intoxicating liquors ; and, in the last year or two, the Dis- 
trict Attorney has had no discretion ; he has been obliged to close his ears 
to all solicitations, and leave the matter of punishment to the courts. The 
law imposes a fine of fifty dollars, and imprisonment of three or six 
months. Parties have been in the habit of expending large sums of money 
to resist their imprisonment. One landlord was prosecuted to the extent of 
the law. Every effort was made to bring him to punishment. He employed 
eminent counsel, removing the case to the U. S. Court, and spent some two 
or three thousand dollars in defending himself. Those two or three thousand 
dollars had more effect in causing him to stop selling liquor, than the fear 
of imprisonment. 

It has always appeared to me that the law, now on the statute book, should 
make some distinction between the case of the poor Irishwoman — one who sells 
lager beer — and the rich landlord. I think there should have been a provision 
like this, — that the court should sentence by a fine of not less than fifty, nor 
more than two thousand dollars, or imprisonment for not less than three, nor 
more than twelve months. The court is now entirely without discretion, 
whether the person is one who sells to make all the money he can out of the 
business, or a poor woman who sells a barrel of ale to help support her chil- 
dren. In that respect, the law has been in fault, I think. 

In another respect, I think there is a defect. It has been said by Mr. 
Gillette, that in some of the small towns in his district, the sale has been sup- 
pressed. I think it is so in my district. In many small towns, the open sale 
has been driven out of sight. But resort is had to the system of expresses, 
which is so prevalent. They bring the liquors into the towns for those who 
wish to consume them, just as much as they desire. Your law on that sub- 
ject is this : that you may prosecute an expressman who brings liquor, but you 



APPENDIX. 69 

must prove that he either bought it at some place not authorized to sell, or 
that he had reason to suppose it was to be sold at some place contrary to law. 
It is impossible to comply with these requirements. The consequence is, that 
where you drive it from the shops, you increase the trade of the expressmen. 
And in the vicinity of large places like Boston, or Worcester, or Taunton, 
to which the express runs, I don't think the sale is stopped. So far as a 
license law goes, my views are very unsettled on that subject. I do not believe 
that the public necessity calls for the license of open grog-shops. It may be 
necessary that the sale of liquor should be provided for in some manner, 
but I do not believe that any hotel needs to keep a bar. In my district, 
take, for instance, the county of Norfolk and that part embracng Roxbury 
and Dorchester, I think I may say that as vigorous efforts have been made 
to suppress the sale there as anywhere. But I do not believe that, in 
Roxbury particularly, one step was gained before the constabulary law was 
in force. I remember that the police of Roxbury were authorized to pros- 
ecute every seller, and I suppose they did it. The number of prosecutions 
that came up led me to think so. We prosecuted and convicted a great 
many ; a great many escaped. But I was told afterward that nearly as 
many grog-shops sprung up behind us as we suppressed. In a large town 
like Roxbury, with their facilities for getting liquor, it is almost impossible 
to suppress the traffic entirely, although much has been gained of late. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooxer.) I understand you to speak of the imperfections 
of the present law. Which, in your judgment, would be most expedient to 
do — to adopt an entirely new system, or amend the present law ? 

A . As a lawyer, I should say, that wherever you can preserve those parts 
of the law which have been now well settled by the courts, it is, of course, 
desirable to do so. A new law becomes practically inoperative for a time 
until the legal principles are settled. This law has the advantage of having 
every legal question settled. 

Q. Did you ever know of a license law that operated to restrain the traffic ? 

A. The license law which prevailed in this Commonwealth was in opera- 
tion so long ago that I was not an observer to any extent. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) What would you think of having incorporated 
upon the present system a system of license in very moderate numbers, as to 
its effect upon the large towns which you say this law does not effectually 
reach ? Take Roxbury, for instance. Suppose a certain number of grocers 
were licensed to sell, and the law could be in effect as to everybody else, 
whether or not that would have a good effect ? 

A. I think a law properly constructed, and in the proper hands for its 
administration, might be made which would accomplish the desired end. 
Having that in view, if any changes are made in this law, the law should not 
be made in the interest of liquor-dealers, but in the interest of the com- 
munity, wholly. I have no sympathy With any law which provides for the 
protection of any men who are persistently violating the present law. I can 
conceive of a license law being passed, and the appointment of proper men, 
under proper restrictions, which would restrain the trade which is now pre- 
vailing. For instance, suppose a law were passed making a public nuisance 
every bar in the Commonwealth, every place where liquor could be sold by 



70 APPENDIX. 

the glass or drink ; if you provide that it may be sold in larger quantities, as by 
the gallon, and to be carried away, I can conceive of its being useful. 

Q. Is there anything in the state of public sentiment, or of the public 
judgment, as to the principle of this law which makes it difficult to enforce it 
in large cities ? 

A. The difficulty that the prosecuting officer meets with officially is, that 
after he has exerted himself till he has a man ready to go to the Plouse of 
Correction, in spite of the lawyers employed by the associated liquor interest, 
if he is a man of a respectable family, having a wife who is respected by the 
community, having respectable daughters, then the very selectmen, the minis- 
ters, the very best men come forward and say to the District Attorney, " We 
pray you to release him ; the law has had its effect." The answer of the 
District Attorney is, that he has nothing to do with it. Then it goes to the 
courts ; and judges have hearts, and they will yield. The consequence is, the 
prosecuting officer, having brought the criminal to the last gasp, he is released- 
Public sentiment is not up to the execution of the law. I remember that we 
had a large class of cases in Dorchester. I said to the authorities, My practice 
is to have these first presented to the trial justice. They said, We think we are 
all right ; we ask you to go ahead. I said, I have prosecuted a great many 
people from Dorchester, and I hardly ever had a case, when I was ready to 
sentence, that a large number of respectable people did not ask for their 
relief. I said I would not touch the cases unless they would say they would 
not interfere. Then we went on until the bottom dropped out, last 
winter. I had on my docket two hundred and twenty cases, and before I left 
the office in April last, knowing I should probably go out of office, I made an 
effort to get pleas of guilty or convictions in almost every case. I think 
they would have been carried out finally. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) State what you mean by the bottom dropping out ? 

A. I mean to say that in all cases in which a party was charged with 
having kept a common nuisance ; that is to say, a place for selling intoxicating 
liquors illegally, the law passed last winter was supposed to have relieved 
those cases, the court being deprived of the power to sentence. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Is there a distinction in the public mind between 
the infraction of this law and in other cases ? 

A . Undoubtedly. 

Q. The law making it a crime to sell, leads people to inquire into the 
principle of the law, does it not ? 

A . I do not know that I can give the reasons. Men who are charged with 
selling liquor, if their social relations are respectable, have a great many per- 
sons who ask for their release, who would not if they were charged with 
larceny or other crime. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Does this indicate an opinion in favor of the open 
sale, or is it an act of mercy on the part of clergymen and others, based on 
the pledge that he will not go again into the traffic ? 

A. I have no doubt it is believed to be an act of mercy ; but I do not 
believe the same act of mercy would be extended to him, if the fine he was 
called upon to pay was large enough to swing half his estate. They would 



APPENDIX. 71 

say, you have boon making money in violation of the law, and you ought; to 
pay for it. 

Q. Then you don't think the penalty large enough ? 

A . I think the government should have it in its power to insist upon it 
that the man who violates the law by selling intoxicating liquors, should be 
obliged to pay a large sum of money. I think persons' pockets are touched 
more than their consciences. I have observed among extreme men an opinion 
that our judges are unworthy to be trusted with this subject. I think 
the law should leave much to the courts. We have as pure a court as 
can be found anywhere, and in the administration of the liquor law, I 
never found a judge who was not willing to co-operate with me. I 
think it should be left with them to determine whether the offender 
is an old one or not, and to graduate the punishment according to the 
offence. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Would you not have a minimum ? 

A . Yes. I am fully of opinion that if there had been this feature of the 
law, I could have crushed out many who sell rum up to the present moment. 

Q. You spoke of not having succeeded in driving out the traffic in large 
towns, though you have in small places. Have you ever used the seizure 
clause ? 

A . The seizure clause is being used by the constabulary force, and I think 
it is a great weapon in their hands. But before, it was difficult to find gen- 
tlemen in the community who would go before a magistrate, and swear that they 
had reason to believe that intoxicating liquors were to be found for sale in a 
certain place ; and then it was quite as difficult to find an officer who would 
go forward and make the seizure. 

Q. You think it is a good weapon where it is used ? 

A. Before that law was in operation, it was the business of nobody to 
enforce the law. Before I was District Attorney I was a justice, and I have 
been obliged to go to the board of selectmen and ask them to sign a com- 
plaints against parties where I deemed a prosecution necessary, and I found 
them very reluctant to do it. 

Testimony of Mr. Gillette, (continued.) 
Mr. Gillette. I should like to make one qualifying statement. I said 
in my statement that I was greatly embarrassed by having rumsellers on the 
jury. That has been the case in some instances. Many hundred dollars 
were lost in consequence of it. It is also true that in a number of instances 
I have had landlords and traffickers on the jury, who have convicted every 
time that the evidence conscientiously required it. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Still, do you think it a wholesome state of things to 
commit the carrying out of the liquor law to his fellow-liquor sellers ? 



Testimony of Ex-Judge Geobge P. Sanger. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How many years have you been prosecuting 
officer in the county of Suffolk ? 
A. In the years 1853 and 1851, and since the spring of 1861. 



72 APPENDIX. 

Q. State the results of your experience, as a judicial magistrate and prose- 
cuting officer, in the execution of the laws of the State. 

A. I come here, as brother Harris did, on the summons of the Committee; 
I am willing to answer any questions that may be put. I shall have to limit 
my statement to my own experience. My experience commenced in 1853. I 
was prosecuting officer in 1853. The law of 1852 was in force, which, as the 
Committee know, had for the penalty, fine, and not necessarily imprisonment. 
In enforcing that law there were some legal objections made. All legal objec- 
tions were made that properly could be made, to get the opinion of the 
Supreme Court on them, and the questions of law settled. I recollect dis- 
tinctly that one of the first trials among these cases was that of a Mr. Brown of 
South Boston. Samuel Dunn Parker, Esquire, defended it. We had a 
stiff fight. The testimony was sufficient to warrant the jury to convict, and 
they did convict, and exceptions were allowed. The result of these trials was 
that in subsequent indictments verdicts were taken by consent, or pleas of 
guilty were entered and the cases continued to abide Brown's case. The 
question of law was not settled until I had left the office of District Attorney. 
But the exceptions were overruled by the Supreme Court, and the cases went 
back for sentence ; and quite a large revenue was derived to the county from 
fines under those prosecutions. 

Very soon, the law of 1855 went into operation, by which the penalty was 
changed so that imprisonment was a necessary punishment. I believe my own 
experience in Suffolk County, as a judge, under the law of 1855, was limited to 
the trial of one case ; because, as you recollect, the law establishing the Superior 
Court in the city of Boston, relieved the judges of the Court of Common 
Pleas from any duties in Suffolk County. I know I never held any court in 
the county except temporarily to relieve the judge to whom the term had been 
assigned. In the case last spoken of, the defendant was charged with being a 
common seller. The counsel for the defendant admitted that his client had 
sold intoxicating liquors as alleged in the indictment, but claimed, that under 
the jury law which was passed by the same legislature that enacted the pro- 
hibitory law, the jury had the right to judge of the law. That was the only 
case I tried in Suffolk County, while a judge, so far as I now recollect. The 
juries refusing to convict common sellers, the prosecutions made afterwards 
were under the Nuisance Act, so called. I knew nothing of those personally 
until 1861. From 1861 until the present time, there has been no substantial 
difficulty in getting verdicts in Boston, in nuisance cases — in such cases as 
were prosecuted. Those which were prosecuted were prosecuted by the 
police, and were substantially cases of nuisance without reference to this 
statute. There was such a state of things about the places that they would be 
nuisances at common law. 

But I believe that, from the time the law of 1855 went into effect until the 
fall of 1865, there was not a conviction, in Suffolk County, of a person charged 
wit& being a common seller. I may be incorrect in this matter ; but I know 
that, during the fall of 1865, the juries were so constituted, or the feeling of 
the public had so changed, the original excitement in reference to the passage 
of the Act having so died away, that the jurors came up conscientiously to the 
discharge of their duties as jurors, and, in cases where the evidence required it, 



APPENDIX. 73 

the)' convicted defendants under indictments both as common sellers and as 
maintaining liquor nuisances. Up to that time, prosecutions had been 
almost entirely under the Nuisance Act, and there was no difficulty in getting 
convictions. Since, they have been of both kinds. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Were there large numbers then ? 

A. It used to be considered so. Then the average was (say) fifty a month. 
This present month, February, 1887, the number of liquor indictments was 
about four hundred and fifty. There are twenty-nine hundred cases since 
chapter 280 of 1866 went into effect. 

The first indictment against the common seller, tried in the fall of 1865, 
was put as an experiment. We went to the trial with some misgivings, but 
with confidence that although the sentiments of the jurors were adverse to 
the law, although some of the jurors were more or less interested in the 
traffic, and although eleven out of twelve, if legislators, would not have voted 
for the law, yet that (and the event did so prove,) they had that regard 
for their duty and their oath that they would find a verdict if the evidence 
was sufficient. They did so ; and after that there were more or less cases tried 
and verdicts taken ; there were but few trials however. And it was probably 
in consequence of the fact that jurors would convict that the defendants 
were willing to plead guilty, and those cases were continued to await the 
decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in McGuire's case. They 
were so continued. That was the work of the court in Suffolk County dur- 
ing 1865 and the beginning of 1866, — January, February, March, April 
and May, 1866. The decision in McGuire's case was made sometime in 
March. All the cases prior to that are on the docket now. And there is a 
case now before the Supreme Court of this Commonwealth, raising the ques- 
tion of the power of the court to sentence now in nuisances prior to the time 
when the chapter 280 of 1866 took effect, notwithstanding that Act. Since 
chapter 280 went into operation, another question of law has been raised, and 
that is before the Supreme Court of the United States. I suppose it is sub- 
stantially settled in Mrs. Sinnot's case. She was charged in the United 
States Court, for this district, with selling liquor without having obtained 
license. She replied, you ought not to charge me for a license unless you 
protect me in sales under it. She said it was unconstitutional. The Supreme 
Court of the United States says it is constitutional. That, I suppose, settles 
the question. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) State that decision again, if you please. 

A. Mrs. Sinnot was indicted in the United States Court for being a 
retailer of liquor without obtaining a retailer's license from the revenue offi- 
cers. She defended in that case, because she said if she got the license they 
would not protect her in sales under it, and because it was unconstitutional to 
require her to take out a license when they would not protect her in sales 
under it. That question was carried to the Supreme Court of the United 
States. They have decided, as I understand, that the law requiring a license 
to be taken out before a person acts as a retailer is constitutional, and must be 
complied with, although it gives no right to sell in violation of th«3 State 
laws. 

10 



74 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) "What is your opinion in regard to the effect of so 
many prosecutions upon the sale of liquor in Boston ? Has it increased or 
diminished it? 

A. It has a tendency to diminish it, and it has in fact diminished it. That 
is seen clearly since the decision in Mrs. Sinnot's case ; for quite a number 
have come to me since then and said they would throw up the business. So 
long as there was only a plea of guilty, and it was continued to abide a deci- 
sion, it seemed easy ; something like giving a promissory note — easy to give, 
but hard to pay. Such a plea was often put in, and the case continued to 
abide ; very likely by the advice of counsel, that no sentence would ever be 
imposed. But now we have about twenty-nine hundred cases, against about 
eleven hundred individuals, in which there are pleas of guilty. And when 
the decision comes back from the Supreme Court, they will be ready for sen- 
tence. The knowledge of that fact is affecting very seriously their feelings. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What would be the amount of fines, if all are 
sentenced the minimum fine ? 

A . Fifty times the number of cases ; $50 being the minimum fine. 

Q. What discretion has the court under this law ? 

A. The fine is not less than fifty, nor more than one hundred dollars. I 
ought, perhaps, to say that the operation of chapter 280 of 1866, decreasing 
the amount of the fine in nuisance cases, from a minimum of $200 and a maxi- 
mum of $1,000, to the present minimum of $50 and a maximum of $100, is 
unfavorable to the revenue from fines in this county. Under the former 
law, fines of $300, $450, and $500, were not uncommon, and in some cases the 
maximum fine of $1,000 was imposed; now the highest fine is $100. If the 
minimum fine could be as now, or lower, and the maximum as before, it would 
work better in this county. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Can the law be enforced so as to accomplish the 
prevention of the sale in Boston ? 

A . I think it can be so enforced as in time to accomplish the prevention 
of the open sale. It is a matter of time ; but it can be done by using the 
seizure clause. 

Q. How far would the suppression of the open sale tend to the suppres- 
sion of the sale and drinking ? 

A. I should not have the opportunity to decide this question, which people 
on the street would have. 

Q. Is it sold still, but less openly ? 

A. I have no doubt it is sold, but less oj)enly. The work of suppression 
is gradual. 

Q. Which would be most likely to protect the country and the peace of 
the community — a system by which some persons should be authorized to sell, 
or a system by which every person should be prohibited from selling ? 

A. That would depend very much, indeed, upon the system. But, looking 
at it as. a prosecuting officer, if there were what is familiarly called a license 
law in operation, and then persons were charged with offending against the 
law — that is selling without a license — some of the objections against the 
present law would be avoided. One objection is, that the law is unjust, that 
it is entirely prohibitory, and that the sale should not be prohibited; that in 



APPENDIX. 75 

matters of diet, and similar matters, there should be no prohibitory law. The 
single objection that it was prohibitory would be removed. But there would 
be another class of objections raised under the operation of a license law, 
such as that there was favoritism. But now it is understood that the law 
itself bears equally upon all. In the trial of cases, if there were indictments 
under the license law, that specific objection would be raised : defendants or 
their counsel would say that it was class legislation, and therefore unfair. 
What would be the effect in the prosecution and trial of such cases would 
remain to be seen from experience. 

With reference to it in another point of view, and that is as the effect upon 
the community, my impression is, as Boston is now, that the having of a 
license law would turn to the support of that law much influence which is 
now lost to the law. It would raise an opposition in other quarters which 
would be against it. The public sentiment of Boston, as I think, is in favor 
of a license law rather than a prohibitory law. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Upon whom would you confer the power to license ? 

A . Upon men who have the interest of the community most at heart. 

Q. We all have that. But in this community ? 

A. I certainly should not wish to be one. I mean that it would not be a 
pleasant power to confer upon any one. But I would confer it upon a body 
of men who are as unsusceptible of influences as the judges of our Supreme 
Court — upon men who would decide the matter entirely for the best interest 
of the community. 

Q. Would you make the price of a license high or low ? 

A . I suppose that the question of revenue comes in there. 

Q. For the best interest of society ? I do not care about the revenue. 

A. I do not know that the best interest of society would require any fee. 
I suppose the best interest of society would be to limit it so as to do the least 
possible harm. And in that way, I do not see how the amount that is to be 
charged, except that the amount might prevent many from applying for 
license, would have any effect. 

Q. Do you think any authority would grant licenses to a very large 
number of persons ? 

A. I cannot say. I should think if they did, it would be unfortunate. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Is it your opinion that the welfare of the com- 
munity requires the restriction, as far as practicable, of the sale of intoxicating 
drinks as a beverage ? 

A. Yes. I do not think there should be any sale at any open bar. 

Q. Do you think the present law as powerful an instrument as we are 
likely to have, if that were used properly, and honestly worked ? 

A. Yes, sir. But that would not express my views fully; for while I 
believe in restricting the sale of intoxicating liquors and their sale at an open 
bar, either in hotels or places of common resort, still I think, as Boston is 
situated, I would, as a legislator, vote for a law under which permission might 
be given to keepers of hotels, for instance, that they might furnish it to their 
guests, as they ask in their petition here (though I have not carefully read 
that petition ;) so that those who stop at the hotels might find the comforts 
they would find at home. 



76 APPENDIX. 

Q. You would not make any distinction between residents and others, in 
such sales ? 

A. No, I do not say that citizens ought not to have places where they can 
purchase alcoholic or fermented liquors for medicinal and other purposes. 

Q. Still, in the interest of the suppression of the traffic, you are of the 
opinion that no more powerful instrument can be had than the present law ? 

A. You cannot have a better machine. The reason is, as gentlemen are 
aware, that there is the ordinary proceeding, the punishment for sales, and 
then that other most efficient feature, the seizure, which may be repeated 
as often as any one can be found who makes oath that there is reason to 
believe that sales are made in any place. And it is for the reason that 
brother Harris stated, that you can touch men so strongly in their pockets. 
Men will not be likely to engage in a business where they are likely to have 
every day seizures made of their stock in trade. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I understand you to believe that it is possible, 
under the operation of the present law, to greatly restrain the traffic in 
Boston ? 

A. Yes, the open traffic. 

Q. You think that law goes towards diminishing it ? 

A . Yes, it is one step. 

Q. What would you think of the idea of the mayor and aldermen of 
Boston, elected, as they are, by the class of people that they are, having full 
authority to give licenses to whom they pleased ? 

A. They are very reputable people, I think. I don't think you ought to 
ask me to give an opinion. They are very reputable : I don't know any 
better man, or one who has the interest of temperance more at heart than 
Mayor Norcross has. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you suppose it is possible, by any machinery, 
to wholly suppress the traffic ? 

A . No, sir. I answer the question precisely as it is put. Nor do I suppose 
it will be possible to suppress the crime of larceny. There will always be 
sometime somebody who will violate law ; and so long as people wish to 
drink, if they cannot get it openly they will get it secretly. 

Q. Assuming this large demand which exists in the community, and 
supposing you are successful in convicting a man a day in the criminal court, 
for every day in the year, while this large demand exists, can you make any 
perceptible impression in the community further than to drive it into secret 
and contraband channels ? 

A. If I should answer that question yes or no, it would limit me to the 
effect of three hundred prosecutions in one year. I do not suppose that 
would be the limit ; because you will see that the most efficient weapon in 
the execution of the law, is the seizure clause. And all I have said with 
reference to its execution in the city of Boston shows, that it is a question of 
time. It cannot be done in a moment. It may be that several juries would 
be found who would not convict. 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 7T 



FOURTH DAY. 

Tuesday, February 26, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, and the hearing of testimony was further 
continued. 

Testimony of Ex-Judge George P. .Sanger, (continued.} 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) I will ask you, looking at the subject under 
consideration from your point of view, and in view of the information which 
has been obtained by you in your capacity of judge and prosecuting officer, 
fc r many years, as well as in view of the facts known to you as a citizen, what 
you would advise, were you a legislator, in reference to the legislation for the 
future, as best adapted to diminish drinking, maintain order, and preserve the 
rights of the people ? 

A. The question is a comprehensive one. Upon the question of prohib- 
iting drunkenness and maintaining order, I do not know that I should have 
any change to make in the present legislation ; that is to say, I do not think 
that there would be in any system of license, any less liquor sold than there 
is now under this law. Perhaps this law would prevent the sale of liquor 
more ; but in reference to what you may call the rights of the people, if you 
include it under that name, I do not know but that I should say the reverse. 
I have been for many years, and am now in favor of a stringent license law. 
My own view in reference to the matter is this : I think the laws in reference 
to the sale of intoxicating liquors are substantially police regulations. Of 
course, therefore, I differ from those who assume the temperate drinking of 
liquor to be a vice, and the sale of liquor in any form, except for medicinal 
and mechanical purposes, a crime. I do not think that the temperate drinking 
of alcoholic and fermented liquors is a vice. I am not prepared to go to that 
extent. I admit the fact which cannot be denied, that if it is.to be indulged 
in, the tendency is to go from a temperate to an intemperate use ; but I am 
speaking of it as regards the temperate drinking of intoxicating liquors, and 
my views formed as long ago as 1852 or 1853, have not been changed, but 
have been substantially confirmed, by what I have seen of the operation of 
the law since. I think that the regulation of the sale of intoxicating liquors 
is a police regulation. I believe that the police regulations applicable to the 
towns and cities of this Commonwealth are different, according to the 
different conditions of the towns. I suppose that a system of police regu- 
lation that would be entirely applicable to the small towns in Berkshire 
County, or in any county in the Commonwealth, would be as inapplicable to 
Boston, and as unlike those that are fitted for Boston, as those which are fitted 
for Boston would be unlike those fitted for New Orleans. I therefore deem 
it a matter of police regulation, but would leave the question of police regu- 
lation to be determined upon by the people of the different places. My 



78 APPENDIX. 

theory, therefore, would be, that under the license law, a Board of Commis- 
sioners should be appointed to grant licenses; that is, extending in one sense 
the provisions of the present prohibitory law, — the present prohibitory law 
provides for the sale of liquor for medicinal and mechanical purposes, — extend- 
ing that to other classes or purposes and extending the number of agents. 
I would have a commission appointed that should grant a convenient number 
of licenses in those cities and towns, that should by a majority of the inhab- 
itants adopt that law. I would, in all other places, have the present law 
applied, and would have the machinery of the present law applied to the 
prevention and punishment of the sale by those not licensed. In regard to a 
license, there should be a suitable number of hotels, proper, reputable hotels, 
in the cities or towns, and such a number either limited by law or such as 
the Commissioners should determine, (better be determined by law,) all 
proper places, where liquor might be sold to all classes of people, excepting 
minors, or common drunkards, or people given to drinking to excess ; I would 
have such restrictions as are known now to people generally, and I would also 
have the selling confined to pure liquor — perhaps giving the commissioners 
the right to visit any place and inspect the liquor that is sold, and if it is not 
pure destroy it ; or perhaps regulating the purity of the liquor by the manner 
in which it shall be purchased. The precise details of the law could be 
arranged by those who drew it ; but the general principle would be to license 
in those towns where the people of the towns wanted it. What we should 
gain by that is that we should avoid that objection to the law which has 
great weight with a great many, (and with a great many in this city,) and 
winch is, I suppose, the cause of these petitions which are sent in here like 
that of Mr. Hardy, and by gentlemen of that class, respectable citizens, who 
have the welfare of the city at heart and who are themselves temperate men, 
upright men, and Christian men. The feeling on their part is that the regu- 
lations of this kind, affecting to a certain extent their diet and their drinking, 
are not called for by the people of the towns or cities, but are forced on them 
by the dominant party of the Commonwealth. They do not sit easy under 
them, and they are restless because they feel them to be a restraint in a matter 
where they should not be restrained. If it were left to the majority vote of 
the people of the cities and towns of the Commonwealth, I believe a very 
large number in the population of the towns would at once vote down the 
proposition to license the sale of intoxicating liquors. There would be but a 
few of the towns and larger cities, so far as I know, or as far as I have heard, 
that would adopt a license law. And in these towns the difficulty in the 
enforcement of the prohibitory law would be obviated thereby. The result 
would be there would be a free, unlimited sale, in the manner designated by 
the law, of such liquors as were permitted to be sold within the limits of the 
license law, whatever the law might be. As I expressed myself in reference 
to the prohibitory law when I was before the Committee at a former hearing, 
I think that in time the present prohibitory law can be enforced ; and if that 
is so, of course a license law can be enforced, and those not licensed prevented 
from selling, the government having the same machinery to apply against 
those not licensed as there is now against all. 



APPENDIX. 79 

Q. (By Mr. Mixer.) If I understand you, Judge Sanger, the views you 
are now expressing grow in no measure out of the weakness of the present 
law, or the failure to execute it ? 

A . No, sir. I admit that it can in time be executed and is executed. 

Q. And that there is considerable effect upon the traffic in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. Upon the open traffic. 

Q. I understand you that the basis of the opinion which you express as that 
the temperance doctrine, as it is at present, is not the true doctrine ? 

A. That the temperance doctrine of some people is not. 

Q. And that the views of the temperance party are wrong ? 

A . No, sir. I would merely say that their views are different from mine. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state precisely what your view is upon 
this point ? 

A. I mean to say that if you call it a true temperance doctrine, it is not 
the temperance doctrine that is maintained by the people (I say it without 
offence) whom you and Mr. Spooner represent ; and I think that the effect 
of a license law, precisely as I stated, would be favorable to the cause of 
temperance in the Commonwealth. 

Q. Whatever may be true in respect to alcoholic beverages as such, even 
as to the moderate use of them, do you think that practical results can be 
obtained by legislation based upon the principle that they are not useful ? 

A. That they are not injurious. 

Q. That is as far as you can go ? 

A. Yes, sir ; precisely in the limits that I have stated. 

Q. So far as that principle would carry you, a sacrifice is made practically 
in submitting to the present prohibitory law ? 

A. Yes, sir. I do not see, if a man wishes alcoholic and fermented liquor 
in his own house to use at any time as a beverage, how he can get it. 

Q. Suppose he cannot get it to use as a beverage. What is the harm ? A 
great many people are deprived of it and it is not an injury ? 

A. But it is not a good either. I cannot say that the occasional drinking 
of alcoholic or fermented liquor is not actually good. 

Q. Well, it is an important point in the argument, to a certain extent, 
on which of these grounds you would have your testimony received ; as to 
whether it is not injurious, or whether it is positively good. 

A. Well, sir, I should say, and I am perfectly free to say that in some 
instances, I consider it a positive good. I have known instances, in my own 
case, where I have been, I think,, positively benefited by drinking a glass of 
whiskey ; or positively benefited by drinking a glass of ale or porter ; and 
that, too, when not given by a physician. 

Q. If I understand you, it was under circumstances where you did not 
regard it as strictly medicine, though it was prescribed by your own judgment ? 

A. At the time I considered it as a medicine, for I do not use it as a 
beverage. 

Q. How do you show that, under such a state of things as there would be 
under the license system which you suggest, there would not be the same 
drinking usages and the same serious consequences tending regularly to excess 
that we have always seen ? 



80 APPENDIX. 

A . There would be a difficulty of course. 

Q. Does not all the difficulty that you have had remain ? 

A . I think not, sir. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to show why not ? 

A. Because you should make a license law more stringent than you have 
ever had before, and enforce it. 

Q. What do you mean by furnishing liquor to everybody but minors and 
inebriates, and that, too, where there is a greater stringency than there has 
been ever before ? 

A. I think you do not understand what I have said to-day in connection 
with what I said when I was before the Committee at the other hearing — 
that I would not have any open bar or grog-shop licensed. 

Q. You would not have any public bar where citizens could walk in and 
call for a glass ? 

A . No, sir. 

Q. You would merely have a place where the traveller could order it ? 

A. Yes, sir; and where the citizen might go and get what was desired. 
I should not wish to be limited to having a prescription from a physician. I 
do not think it would be entirely fair to limit it to what is generally under- 
stood by medical purposes. I think that if I had friends who were accus- 
tomed to drink wine, or accustomed to drink fermented or alcoholic liquors, I 
should wish to permit them in my house to have what they were accustomed 
to have at their homes , that I ought not to send to the agent or grocer to 
buy the liquor as for medicinal purposes ; or that, if I had it in my house, I 
should have had to buy it in anticipation of such purposes. 

Q. Then your idea is to have places appointed under a system of licenses 
for the sale of liquor as a beverage ? 

A. I hardly think that is a fair way to put it. 

Q. I wish to know if the point is not just this : that because liquors as a 
beverage arc frequently not injurious, and frequently at other times are bene- 
ficial, and since we are all liable to have friends who use it as a beverage, 
therefore the sellers should have the privilege of selling them to be used as a 
beverage as well as for medicine ? 

A. I do not know that I would distinguish between the sale of it for 
medicine and the sale of it as a beverage. I would desire a place where 
people could go and purchase for either purpose. 

Q. I should like to ask you on one or two other points. Here is a place 
where a man can go and get liquor as a beverage. Suppose that the licensed 
seller should think that this man ought not to have it ; what principle is that 
seller to judge upon ? How would you regulate a license law to make it 
have anything of a stringent character, and yet leave the purchaser to buy 
just what he pleases and just as often as he pleases. 

A. That is a question of faith in the licensee. 

Q. Then you would have the licensee responsible to the man to whom he 
sells it ? 

A. I should think it would be very easy to have some general term to fix 
this matter, as, for instance, that the licensee should not sell to any person 
under the inlluencc of intoxicating liquor, or to any person that is drunk. 



APPENDIX. 81 

Q. Well, as to the term drunk, we have there a sliding scale, do we 
not ? Precisely at what measure of inebriation will he stop ? Shall the 
licensee judge when a man has arrived at a given point ? 

A. He must go upon his own judgment, and the jury, if the case comes up 
before them, will judge of that matter when it comes before them. 

Q. I take it that your objection to the law is that it trenches somewhat 
upon the rights of the individual by making it difficult, if not impossible, for 
any man to get liquor for a beverage ; and yet you give a power to the licensee 
to say when a purchaser has reached a point at which he ought not to drink 
any more ? Do you not lodge the power in the licensee which you say 
transcends the rights of the individual when lodged in the hands of the State ? 

A. I do not see that it would. 
* Q. At what point does a man have a right to say when he has a right to 
take one glass more ? 

A. That is a practical question that any gentleman can answer as well as 
myself. 

Q. Well, shall it be when he can talk and see and go, or when he has lost 
those powers and faculties ? 

A. You can put a great many questions of that kind that are difficult to 
answer for the simple reason that it is a practical question arising in each par- 
ticular case. 

Q. Does not that practical difficulty inhere in license schemes ? That is, 
do you not, at ever turn and step, in every individual experience, involve that , 
very objection ? 

A. Undoubtedly, sir. 

Q. And where it involves that difficulty, is it possible to fix any definite 
point where you can determine whether a man shall drink one glass more or 
not? 

A. Unquestionably, in any system of licensing, or of any restrictions that 
are put upon any traffic, there are points in which there would be constant 
difficulties occurring, just precisely as there are under the present law. You 
would find that there are difficulties arising constantly in the execution of the 
present law. 

Q. Is not a licensee under the temptation of his profits to sell when he 
ought not to ? 

A. I should say so. 

Q. That is a clear temptation, is it not ? 

A. I should say so. 

Q. Then, if the licensee believes in his business, and in the principle that 
underlies his business, namely, the good of alcoholic beverages, does not 
that fact disqualify him in judging of the merits- of the question ? 

A. If you speak of tendency, it may have a remote tendency. 

Q. As far as it affects the man who drinks, is it not clear that the more he 
approaches the point when he ought not to have another glass, the less likely 
he is to see it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 
. Q. Then would there not be a tendency to judge too leniently in favor of 
the person who buys the liquor ? 
11 



82 APPENDIX. 

A. There is undoubtedly a tendency in 'their minds in this direction, 
precisely as there is on the other side to judge too harshly. 

Q. Does that not show how the license system keeps open the door for all 
the inebriety that prevails at the present time ? 

A. Well, it keeps open the door so far as this : that it permits the sale of 
one glass of liquor, and, if the sale of one glass of liquor tends to intoxication 
and drunkenness, then, of course, it leaves open the door to inebriety. In all 
that I have said here, I repeat what I said before, that I would not have an 
open bar in Boston, nor in the Commonwealth. I would not have a grogery, 
so to speak ; but I would have those places where people could go and get, if 
they wanted, good liquor. 

Q. If I understand you, you desire that each locality should be authorized 
by a judicious license law, to have places of sale, at the option of the citizens. 

A. Yes, sir ; that the license law shall be in force in those towns where the 
people shall vote for it. 

Q. Well, now suppose that the mass of the towns of the State should, with 
great unanimity, refuse to adopt the license system, nine out of every ten 
voters voting against it, and yet that Boston, Chelsea, Lowell, Lawrence, 
Springfield, Newburyport, Salem, and a few others of the larger towns should, 
by a bare majority or otherwise, vote for a license system, do you not think 
it would practically undermine the effect of the law in the other towns of the 
Commonwealth, however unanimous they may have voted for no license ? 

A. The inhabitants of those towns unquestionably could go to those who 
are licensed in other towns and buy liquors. 

Q. And it could be sent to those towns by express conveyances ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you not think that Boston alone dominates the whole State in 
this? 

A . In the sense that the larger place dominates the other places. 

Q. Would not that suppression, according to the will of the majority in the 
rural districts, be impracticable, because of this dominant influence of the 
larger cities ? 

A. It would be a greater convenience for the people in these towns to send 
to places near them, than it would be to send to New York and other places 
in the adjacent States where the traffic is permitted. 

Q. Should you deem it a matter of regret that, in the towns which should 
thus prohibit licenses, individuals would be able to get liquor from other towns 
and cities ? 

A . Well, that resolves itself into this : whether I should regret that a 
person who wishes to drink a glass of liquor has an opportunity of gratifying 
his appetite in that matter. I cannot say that I should regret that, if he is a 
temperate drinker. 

Q. So that if the majority of the voters in the various towns should 
decide in favor of prohibiting licenses, you would not regret it if in such a 
prohibition they should fail ? 

A . I should not say that. I think there is a distinction between the two 
questions. One is a question whether I would regret, so far as the individual 
is concerned, that he should have an opportunity of drinking a glass of liquor 



APPENDIX. 83 

if he wished ; and the other is, whether I wished that the will of the majority- 
should prevail. I should say that I wished that the will of the majority 
should prevail. 

Q. Why the wish of the majority of the town any more than that of the 
city? 

A. Because, as I said at the start, I think it is a matter of police regula- 
tion ; and that differs in different places and in different localities. In a 
small town in the country there would be different police regulations required 
from what there would be in Boston. 

Q. Is there any question of principle involved in cities that there is not in 
small towns, in this respect ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not know that there is. 

Q. % Why should there be any difference; I mean beyond the external 
order and form of the labor of the police. When you come to the principle 
of that labor, what is the difference between the large places and the small 
places, as bearing upon the broad merits of tins question ? 

A. So far as the sale of liquor goes, it is the same in one place as in 
another, as to its effect upon the individual ; but then so far as the wishes of 
the majority of the people and the welfare and prosperity of the people are 
affected, it is for them to decide. Now it is the opinion of a great many of 
the people of Boston that if hotels are not permitted to furnish alcoholic and 
fermented liquors to their guests, and if it is to be said out of the Common- 
wealth, in other States, that the hotels are shut up in Boston, or rather that 
no liquor is to be drank there, that system of legislation operates as an injury 
to Boston. How far that goes I can only gather from what other people say. 
I know that is a prominent and general feeling among portions of the business 
community of Boston. 

Q. How would you have hotels furnish liquors ? 

A. I think that they might furnish liquor upon the call of the guests at 
their table, if they wished, or at their rooms, if they desired. 

Q. But no room into which they could go for that purpose ? 

A. It would amount substantially to that. 

Q. Would it not amount substantially to this, that it would necessarily 
involve open bars ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think it would. I mean by that a place accessible 
from the street, where all persons might go in. 

Q. I wish to ask the question, if the present prohibitory law is an infringe- 
ment upon the rights of citizens, why a restriction such as you propose, 
authorizing towns by vote to exclude the use of intoxicating liquors as a 
beverage, is not also an infringement upon the rights of the citizens ? 

A. That is, if the restriction of the sale is an infringement, why is not the 
permission of the sale an infringement ? 

Q. No. I understand you that the present prohibitory law is an infringe- 
ment upon the right of the citizen, as it tends to exclude him from the use 
of intoxicating liquor. 

A. I gave that as an argument of those in favor of the license law. 

Q. Did I understand you to say that was your opinion ? 



84 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. Though I did not use the term infringement ; but I will 
take that term. 

Q. Why is it not an infringement upon the rights of the citizen ? 

A. It is an infringement upon their police regulations which they must 
submit to a vote of the town ? 

Q. So that the vote of the town is legitimate and the vote of the State is 
not? 

A. I should be willing to go that extent. There is no difference between 
the vote of the State and the vote of all the towns substantially. The only 
objection, in the case of a law of this character, is, that the dominant will of 
the State is forced upon the town ; and you avoid that difficulty by giving it 
to the people of the place itself to determine by vote. 

Q. But do you not involve another difficulty, the power of criminal legis- 
lation being with the State, and not with the town ? 

A. The power of criminal legislation is with the State. But here we 
come back to the difference of principle upon which you and I start from the 
beginning, and that is, that I do not consider the temperate use of alcoholic 
drinks as a vice ; nor do I think that, unless it is prohibited by law, that the 
sale of it is a crime. 

Q. Now, touching the question of business, I understand you to have 
expressed the opinion of some persons, not your own, that the suppression of 
the traffic of intoxicating liquors as a beverage should not be applied in the 
case of hotels. Do you think that travellers as a general thing select hotels 
where liquors are sold ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you conversant with the feelings of the merchants, for example, 
from the distant sections of the country on that point ? 

A. I have conversed with many, and the opinion is uniform. The unani- 
mous feeling that I have heard in reference to that point is that even among 
temperance men, (I mean those who in conversation say that they are, and 
show no indication to the contrary,) as a matter of preference, they would go 
to hotels where they knew that alcoholic and fermented liquors could be had. 

Q. Have you ever fallen in with temperance men who do not do that ? 

A. No, sir. I never have had conversation with any gentlemen who said 
that they did not prefer to go to those hotels. 

Q. Will you state broadly and in a general way what the result of the 
traffic in liquors is upon the wealth of the State, restricted or unrestricted, so 
far as it is sold and used as a beverage ? 

A. It is much like any article of luxury ; I suppose the general question 
of political economy would come in there. 

Q. Is it a gain or a loss ? 

A. I do not know that it is a gain or a loss. It is a question that I am 
not competent to answer. 

Q. Have you any opinion whether the burden of taxation is increased by 
the present drinking usages ? 

A. I have no doubt that it is largely. 

Q. How much would it be, in your opinion, in this Commonwealth ? 



APPENDIX. 85 

A. I could not give the percentage. I think a large portion of the 
criminal costs of the Commonwealth are from that cause. There are very 
few cases into which the use of intoxicating liquors does not more or less 
enter. 

Q. Would you be startled by the statistics on that point if they were very 
large ? 

A. No, sir. I have seen them. 

Q. Do you think that the people should be taxed to pay the pauperage 
arising from the drinking usages of society ? Would you think it any infringe- 
ment if the State should tax a man to defray the expenses and repair the 
ravages occasioned by the use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A . Undoubtedly he may think it is. 

Q. As a matter of principle, is it not an infringement ? 

A. As a matter of principle, an increase of the burden of taxation 
increases the infringement. 

Q. Granting your premise, that the use of alcoholic beverages is a good, 
do you think that the evils that would be endured by the absolute practical 
prohibition of them would bear any comparison with the existing social evils 
arising from the use "of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, in point of infringe- 
ment ? 

A. Putting it in that way, which of the two I would prefer, unrestrained 
sale or absolute prohibition, I should prefer absolute prohibition. 

Q. You would have no question on that point ? 

A. Not the slightest. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Why would you confine the licensed hotels to 
any particular class ? Why not extend it to all hotels ? 

A . I mean all reputable hotels. 

Q. What should constitute a reputable hotel ? 

A. Well, that is a question that is well understood here in Boston. 
When I say first-class hotels, I do not mean those that charge the highest 
prices. I mean that the guest of a hotel, whether he pays four dollars a day, 
or only a dollar and a half per day, may have the opportunity, if he deems 
it a necessity, or, if it is his custom to have it, of having a glass of liquor. 

Q. What is your judgment with regard to the case of applying the present 
prohibitory law to the licensed dealer at those points where he transcends the 
privileges given to him under the other law ? 

A. I suppose the law would be applied as any law ; you can only tell the 
general principle where there is some difficulty. Supposing the licensed 
dealer should sell to a person who is intoxicated, he should forfeit his license* 
I do not suppose there would be any great difficulty in proving whether a man 
was intoxicated, any more than there is now in our municipal courts. If the 
qnestion was as to the sale of impure liquor, it might be settled in the same 
way that it is now in the selling of adulterated milk, for instance. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You know that heretofore there has been great 
trouble in getting convictions, because jurors have disagreed ? 

A . There have been difficulties. 

Q. It has been so difficult, has it not, that for some years only a few 
convictions were obtained ? 



86 APPENDIX. 

A. Upon tlie single matter of common sellers. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) You stated In your testimony that you would license 
other places than hotels. Would you allow the purchaser to drink that liquor 
upon the premises ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then, would you license eating-houses, as they are called ? 

A . That would involve the principle of eating at hotels. 

Q. Then you would consider an eating-house as, so far, a hotel ? 

Q. Yes, sir. If the person went to an eating-house, I would not object to 
his having -wine with his meals. 

Q. Or any other liquor ? 

A. Wine, or any other liquor. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) How many licenses would it require for the 
city of Boston ? 

A. That would be for the commissioners to determine. 

Q. How many would there be if you licensed every hotel and eating- 
house ? 

Q. I cannot give the number of eating-houses. I do not mean to say that 
I would license every house. 

Q. (By Mr. Swan.) I understand you to say, that you wish to remove 
the prohibitory law by reason of its being inefficient with its various instru- 
mentalities ; and that you place temperance in the hands of the licensee, he 
being a judge of the sale of liquor to the individual, until he has evidences 
that that individual has become drunk ? 

A. No, sir. I was not aware that I had said that, nor anything bearing 
that view. 

Mr. Spooner submitted a motion, that the counsel, in behalf of the peti- 
tioners, should bring in a bill such as was desired. It was, however, ruled by 
the Committee that the petitioners could not be asked to bring in a bill. 

Testimony of A. O. Brewster. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Will you be kind enough to inform the Commit- 
tee whether you have had any, and what opportunity in the profession of the 
law, and as prosecuting officer of the law, to observe the operation and the 
effect upon the temperance of the community by existing legislation ? 

A. From 1855 down to 1862 I acted as one of the prosecuting officers of 
this county. The last two years I acted as the principal prosecuting officer. 

Q. That was during the illness of the late district-attorney ? 

A. Yes, sir; during the illness of the late district-attorney, Mr. Cooley. 
During the greater portion of that time it was almost impossible to procure 
convictions under what is called the prohibitory law. It was not so difficult 
under the license Act. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) You mean under the clause relating to common 
sellers ? 

A. Yes, sir. Under that chapter juries were unwilling to convict; my 
own experience was at that time, and from my own observation, derived from 
personal conversation with jurors, that the difficulty did not mainly arise from 



APPENDIX. 87 

men on the jury engaged in the traffic, but that it almost invariably came 
from other parties who believed that the law was arbitrary and oppressive, 
and that under other statutes of the Commonwealth, juries had an oppor- 
tunity to judge of the law as well as the fact, the opinion of the Supreme 
Court to the contrary, notwithstanding. 

Q. My question was intended to draw from you any opinion which you 
might have arrived at in reference to the availability of the present law, as 
disclosed by its operations under your eye, during the period of time which 
you refer to, down to the present time, in the reduction of drunkenness in 
the city of Boston ? 

A. I think there is more drunkenness, by one-third, than when I first 
received my appointment as district-attorney. I think that the prosecutions 
for the last two years under the Maine Law, as it is sometimes called, have 
failed to decrease the crime of intemperance. My own personal observation 
and experience are that for the past six months, the frequency and persistency 
with which the State Constabulary have followed up the liquor dealers, have 
had the effect of concealing, in some degree, the number of places, but have 
not in the least degree lessened intemperance. The effects of prosecution 
have been to drive certain parties from certain places, and by so doing they 
have driven the liquor into more secret places ; and I will illustrate it in this 
way, which in my judgement is a material fact. That within the past four 
months I have been consulted here in Boston by three different men, profes- 
sionally, as to whether or not they would have a right to get up organizations 
or social clubs, made up of fifty, or more or less, where each man could have 
his liquor. Last week, Thursday, I was consulted by five different men from 
one of the largest cities of the Commonwealth out of Boston, as to their 
rights under such an organization ; and as to whether they could be reached 
by any process of law, provided they organized what they called a social club, 
with a constitution and by-laws ; or whether they could have a right to drink 
among themselves. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What was your counsel to those gentlemen ? 

A. My legal advice to them was that there was a way which could be 
provided for evading the present laws of the Commonwealth. 

Q. How many years were you Assistant District- Attorney ? 

A . About six. 

Q. Were you at that time desirous of making the law an efficient one ? 

A. I did my duty in the place, I think, as a prosecuting officer. 

Q. Did you desire the success of your work ? 
- A. I never believed in the law. I believed it then as now, founded in 
hypocrisy and deceit. In addressing a jury, no man ever knew from my 
manner or mode of argument what my personal and private convictions 
were. 

Q. Do you think you ever addressed a jury who did not know from the 
various modes of evidence what your opinions on the law were, or what your 
wishes were as to their verdict ? 

A. I have not often addressed a jury where they knew any more of my 
views or of my personal convictions in relation to the law than I now know 
what you are going to preach about next Sunday. 



88 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you believe that you ever addressed a jury were they fell into the 
mistake that you was in favor of the law itself? 

A. Every juryman whom I have addressed, knows that I was in the habit 
of talking to them pretty earnestly and decidedly in favor of the vindication 
of the law, and not a word ever dropped from my lips to indicate what my 
personal convictions were in reference to the operation of the law before any 
juror, nor before any living judge. 

Q. Do you think your answer covers the ground of the question ? 
A. I do. 

Q. Do you think there was no way for the judge or jury to know your 
opinions ? 

A. I do not know but that at sometime the foreman of a jury may have 
known what my convictions were in relation to the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you think that the system of a license law 
has done anything to suppress the evil of intemperance ? 

A . I do not think that the license law failed in its operations so much as the 
present one. I think it was stringent enough in its character. I think that a 
license law such as was introduced here some years ago, and which was drawn 
up to some extent by Gen. Butler, of Lowell, would have the effect of lessen- 
ing crime, and reducing intemperance a little. My own judgment is that 
you never can suppress intemperance until God in his infinite wisdom brings 
the world to a righteous civilization. 

Q. Can you give me the general features of that bill ? 
A . No, sir ; I have been trying to recall the details, but I cannot ; but I 
recollect that it was full of details and very stringent. There were a good 
many provisions and limitations, without which, I should say, that a license 
law would be inoperative and void. 

Q. You do not remember the character of the laws existing here twenty- 
five or thirty years ago ? 
- A . I have heard of them. 
Q. Do you know that they were very stringent ? 

A. I have only read of them. I have been told that they were not so 
stringent as the one that I refer to. 

Q. You think that a license law, enforced by the State Constabulary, 
could do something ? 

A. I think the license system, under the administration of the present 
State Constabulary, with such provisions and limitations as should guard 
against the* disposition to cheat and defraud, would have the effect of 
producing a better state of things than at present, and would promote 
good order in the community. 

Q. Why cannot the police of Boston carry out this law just as well ? 
A. They can, if you do not interfere with them. 

Q. So that you think that three hundred and seventy-five men would be 
impeded in their exertions by the exertions of about forty men who make up 
the State Constabulary? 

A. As long as the State Constabulary exists, I put my argument upon 
the ground that it would be very difficult to abolish the office, and therefore, 
the State Constabulary would still continue to interfere in some degree with 
the city police. 



APPENDIX. 89 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you remember the evidence that you gave five 
or six years ago, on that very point, before a committee of the legislature ? 

A. Perfectly well. 

Q. Do you recollect saying that the jurymen refusing to convict were gen- 
erally from one to four ? 

A. Yes, sir ; but when I had occasion to try cases before a jury, I never 
found that the influence against conviction (I mean in the majority of cases) 
came from those engaged in the traffic. 

Q. You did not so testify then, did you ? 
- A. I think I did. 

Q. Is your recollection clear on that point ? 

A. I think it is. I recollect the occasion very well, and the room I was 
in, and gentlemen who were present. 

Q. How many times have you been before a committee of the legislature 
on this subject ? 

A . I think but once ; but perhaps twice. 

Testimony of Rev. E. M. P. Wells. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Boston, at 37 Purchase Street. 

Q. What are your particular duties ? 

A . I am a clergyman of the Episcopal Church ; but I am employed also in 
a mission to the poor and to the wicked. 

Q. Is there any institution that you have charge of? 

A. The St. Stephen's House, where we afford relief to a great number of 
people. I cannot hardly tell how many in the course of the year, but we dis- 
tribute several thousand dollars in the necessaries of life. As for instance, we 
give some thirty or forty thousand meals in the course of the year ; and then 
bread and flour and meal and tea and coffee and sugar, etc., at people's 
houses ; and in that way we become acquainted with some thousands of people. 
My own congregation, those whom I officiate for and to on Sundays, are 
a smaller number, and generally speaking, they are a pretty temperate 
people. 

Q. Do your duties require you to circulate pretty freely among the poor 
in that part of the city ? 

A. That is my chief business, and occupies more of my time than anything 
else. 

Q. What are your observations in reference to the temperance or intem- 
perance of this class of people ? 

A . If you will pardon me, I will say first, that I have been always a very 
strong friend of temperance, and I have seen the necessity of absolutely 
abstaining from the use of liquors ; and, if I could, sir, make any sacrifice, 
even of life, if it was my duty, I would make it for the sake of putting an 
end to this horrible traffic down among the poor, those whose only luxuries 
(I mean among a great many of them) are rum and tobacco. They resort to 
them, and it does make very sad work among them. You do not realize it. 
Up-town people do not know of the starving, and the freezing, and the 

12 



90 APPENDIX. 

quarrels, and the beating of wives, and the turning out-doors of children, and 
that wretched suffering which would make almost any man do anything to 
stop it. 

Q. What is the condition of drunkenness or temperance at the present 
time, as compared with previous times ? 

A . Well, I can remember, sir, ever since some fifteen years ago, when a 
change took place in our laws. The sale of liquor has been on the increase 
since then, both in the number of drinking-places, and in the number of per- 
sons obtaining drink. 

Q . Is there any particular cause that you attribute this to ? Is there any- 
thing in the manner in which they get it and keep it ? 

A. Oh, they can get it well enough. Liquor is kept in many places; 
sometimes it is in the cellar, and sometimes in the back-room. They knOw 
where to go for it, and do go for it, and get it. It is not necessary to put up 
a sign " Rum at three cents a glass." They know where to get it, and they 
will get it. Even after the efforts of the State Constabulary, I am afraid they 
have not made any difference among us. Among a more respectable class of 
people, perhaps they may have stopped it to some extent ; I do not know. 

Q. Have you noticed the fact of people carrying in quantities into their 
houses ? 

A. Oh, frequently, frequently. And in regard to the sale, if people think 
an officer is coming about, they will have nothing but the healthful groceries 
which are usually kept, but they have got a bottle in their closets, which are 
at the next door, as they usually live in the same house ; and before that bottle 
is out, Jim or Sam is sent to get another bottle full, and this process is kept 
up all day long in that way. 

Q. It is a fact, is it not, that the liquor is carried more into the dwelling- 
houses of late ? 

A. Oh, yes, sir. The trouble is, that they do not give our people good 
£rog. I should think that if you could destroy this base evil, it would destroy 
one-half the evil connected with the sale of liquor. It is poisonous stuff, and 
they can get it so cheap ; and they not only get drunk, but that which comes 
after it, the delirium tremens, is worse than anything that I have been able to 
observe before. 

A. Have you noticed, as a fact connected with the increase of intemper- 
ance, that it extends also to women and children ? 

A . I do not know but there has been more of an increase among the 
women than among the men. 

Q. But is there not an increase in the number of women who are intem- 
perate ? Do not the women and children get drunk ? 

A. Yes, sir; and the men do too. Sometimes the man is the drinker of 
the family, and sometimes the woman, and sometimes both. Sometimes one 
begins and then gets the other into it ; and they both go on like husband and 
wife, one body and one bottle. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state if you were engaged in your duties 
at the time of the old license system, fifteen years ago ? 
A. Yes, sir, I was. 



APPENDIX. 91 

Q. What has been your observation since that system went out of use, as 
to the progress of intemperance in your district, and the number of places 
where liquor was to be obtained, and the amount drank ? 

A. As I have just stated, it was since that time, or about that, time, that 
it has been on the increase. I do not say that it was owing to the system of 
laAvs, but that was the aspect of things. Within six months after the city 
government had refused all licenses, and people were told that they could not 
sell, you could observe places springing up here and there, perhaps five or six 
right along together. 

Q. How is it now as to the actual fact as to the number of places in your 
district, compared with that of other times ? 

A. About four or five times the number, as well as I can judge. They 
sell, but they do not sell so large a quantity. What ten would do before, is 
divided between seventy or a hundred now, and they sell on a smaller 
scale ; they sell now by the glass. 

Q. Has there been any diminution in the amount sold generally ? 

A. I cannot say as to that. I should think not. I cannot see how so 
many should get drunk so much, unless it is more poisonous. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You have kept minutes by which you can form an 
estimate as to this ? 

A. No, I have not ; it is from my observation. 

Q. Supposing you were to testify to the matter of fact on that point. Sup- 
pose this were a court of justice. Should you feel at liberty to say that the 
number of places is greater ? 

A. Why, I would, if I have got any sense of observation about it"; I 
believe it most fully. I cannot state that such a man's name is John Jones, 
but I believe it to be because he has told me so. 

Q, Do you mean to say that, in your testimony so far, you have that evi- 
dence ? 

A. No, sir; they do not come to me to make confessions of that kind, I 
warrant you. 

Q. But you think that the sale has increased ? 

A. I never made any particular calculations in regard to it. 

Q. How does the population of Boston compare with what it was ? 

A. You can tell that better than I can. In my own locality, I should 
think the population was about the same at the time I have been speaking of 
as it is now. Commerce is driving out some of the population and building 
up storehouses ; but that class of the population I should think would be about 
the same. I do not think it has increased, because commerce has crowded 
out a good deal of the population. 

Q. You speak of having procured men to abstain from liquors. Do you 
mean giving them pledges ? . 

A. Yes, sir ; most solemn pledges. 

Q. You are yourself a pledged abstainer ? 

A. No, sir, I am not. I have offered frequently to other people, to pledge 
myself to abstain, if they would abstain ; but they said that they would 
pledge themselves without my doing so ; and I have never found it necessary 



92 APPENDIX. 

to do so yet. God has been pleased to give me sense and resolution enough 
to abstain, and in His kindness has kept me along in it thus far. 

Q. You say you have never found it necessary ? You mean what ? 

A. I think that when a person gets in the way of drinking, his best way 
is to cut off entirely. I have never found it necessary. 

Q. I should like to ask you whether you think a man's personal influence 
to lead a man to abstain totally, is as good as if he himself were an abstainer ? 

A. I think it is, sir, really ;. but I cannot say. I do not know whether 
these people whom I have pledged know that I am not in the habit of drink- 
ing. I do not have it upon my table. I have had it ordered by physicians 
two or three times ; and the order has been made peremptory by some of our 
best physicians ; but I do not think I am what would be called a drinking 
man at all ; if so I cannot help it. 

Q. Do you feel that the execution of the existing prohibitory law would 
be an evil in the neighborhood of which you speak ? 

A. I would give a good deal if it could be done. 

Q. You do not see any evil eifect from the execution of it ? 

A. It would not be immediate; I do not know what it would be as a 
precedent. 

Q. Have you read the report of the State Constabulary ? 

A. I have not read it with exactness. I presume they have done a great 
deal of good. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I understand you to be in this state of mind : 
you see the evils of intemperance to be very great, and you do not see them 
diminished, or at least you do not see them removed under the present state 
of things, and therefore you hope the state of things can be improved under 
some kind of a license law ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. How would it be as to suppressing the sale by any license law, supposing 
that a hundred men were licensed in this city ? 

A. I will answer your question as the Yankee does, by asking another. I 
would ask you if you do not see that if fifty or a hundred (or as many as the 
legislature should think best) were licensed to sell good spirits, and they 
were rigidly bound and compelled, by constant weekly investigation, to sell 
nothing but pure spirits, it would be a great privilege, pecuniarily, to them ? 
I cannot say whether it would do any good or not ; but would they not be so 
much of a powerful police ? Would it not be for their interest to see that 
others did not sell, who were not licensed ? I answer the question in that way. 

Q. But, supposing that they are, how are they going to enforce the law ? ■ 

A. They have the police of the city, and the State Constabulary, and if 
they are not numerous enough, they can have more appointed. 

Q. You say that some fifteen years ago, under the license law, there were 
not so many sales as at present, under the prohibitory law ? 

A . Yes, sir ; there is no question about it. 

Q. What date should you give to that time when they were so few ? 

A. Somewhere about fifteen years ago; I cannot give the precise date. I 
remember of having been inquired of, by a gentleman who was in the legis- 
lature at the time this matter came up before it, before a vote was taken, as 



APPENDIX. 93 

to what my advice would be ; and it was the only time we ever differed on a 
matter of that kind, and on this we did differ pointedly. 

Q. Shall you be surprised when I tell you that there have boen no licenses 
in Boston, with the exception of nine months, for twenty-five years ? 

A. You know better on that subject than I do ; I should be surprised. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Suppose that there should be a license system in 
which the supervision that you have referred to should take effect, would 
there be any inclination on the part of these people to go to these low and 
furtive places, if they could get the liquor at the open places ? 

A. Yes, sir; there would be, for the reason that they could get it for a 
third or a half of the price ; but if the license law were established they could 
not get it in these places so much. 

Q. Would it be ferreted out of these places ? 

A. 1 think there is no question about it at all. I should think it could be 
rooted out almost wholly. They would get it, I suppose, somewhat, but they 
would be then obliged to get something, if they got any, that would be better. 

Q. Do you remember of any case under the license system, where the 
unlicensed were suppressed ? 

A . I do not know of any case. 

Testimony op Rev. J. A. Bolles, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Will you be kind enough to state your position, 
and in what your ministry consists ? 

A. I am rector of the Church of the Advent, which is a parish of the 
Protestant Episcopal Church, in this city, on Bowdoin Street. My parish is a 
free church, and we have, consequently, a large number of persons connected 
with us, perhaps from fifteen hundred to two thousand, who look to us for 
whatever ministrations they require. 

Q. What opportunity does this ministration afford you to observe the con- 
dition of the lower and poorer classes ? 

A. We are thrown more or less in contact with the poorer classes ; and 
yet I do not think the very poorest, or the same class of persons with whom 
Dr. Wells is accustomed to minister. My parish being a free parish, both 
rich and poor attend, and yet not a great many who may be called very poor. 

Q. I would inquire, from your observation for the last ten or fifteen years 
in connection with your position, as to the advance or retrograde of intem- 
perance and drunkenness ? 

A. As far back as 1834 or '35, 1 was very much interested in the temper- 
ance cause, and delivered a good many temperance lectures upon what was 
then the temperance platform ; and then when the subject came to interest 
the minds of politicians, and the matter became a subject of law and compul- 
sion, from that time to the present, I have not any doubt that intemperance 
has very much increased ; nor have I any doubt that the public mind is 
demoralized upon the whole subject. I think it has, for instance, demoralized 
the public mind, by giving a false standard of morality ; and I doubt if there 
can be any greater injury to good morals than the setting up of false standards 
of morality. 

Q. Will you explain a little at that point ? 



94 APPENDIX. 

A . I mean, for instance, that the use of ardent spirits, as a beverage, is 
not always a sin per se, nor is the selling of it always a sin ; and when you 
say they are, you violate the truth, nor does the public conscience respond to 
any such interpretation of what is right and what is wrong. I have lamented 
that the temperance question has been taken out of the power of the church 
and of the gospel, and made a subject of politics and of prohibitory laws. 

Q. Will you state whether, in your intercourse with men, that false system 
has had any effect in preventing the thinking, quiet portion of the community 
from joining in this movement ? 

A. It has prevented many from actual sense of duty. A man could not 
go into that without violating his sense of duty. 

Q. Has there been any influence in withdrawing from strong and from 
actual co-operation, many among the respectable, religious portion of the 
community with whom you have associated ? 

A. I have not any doubt of it. 

Q. How does the co-operation of that portion of community compare with 
what it was from 1825 to 1835 ? 

A. Well, my memory would not go back so far as 1825 in respect to this 
subject. 

Q. How was it from 1830 to 1850 ? 

A. In 1834 or 1835 I remember very well; and I think the drinking hab- 
its were not only much affected but entirely controlled : and the same drink- 
ing habits have now returned. I speak of people having liquor on their tables. 

Q. Was it or not a fact, sir, in the period to which you allude (1834 or 
1835,) down to 1845, that the clergy of all denominations took an active part 
in the cause of temperance ? 

A. I think they did. 

Q. How is it now ? Do they take the same part now that they did then ? 

A. I do not believe they do, sir. 

Q. What is the reason ? 

A. I think they cannot conscientiously enter into the temperance move- 
meut, as it is carried on now, because if they do they must become politicians. 

Q. Is not the moral opinion of the community greatly weakened in the 
way of standing behind the enforcement of any law ? Is there the same 
public sentiment now as there was then ? 

Q. No, sir ; not in regard to any law. 

Q. Was this change owing to the better part of community or to the 
liquor-sellers ? 

A. I think it never had anything to do with the liquor-sellers. 

Q. Can you form an opinion how great that change was, from 1835 to 
1845, in withholding any active aid in the cause of temperance ? 

A. It seems to me that there is scarcely any of the same kind of influence 
existing now with that class of clergy which formerly existed upon that 
subject. 

Q. Is this difference confined to any particular denomination ? 

A. I do not think it is, sir. 

Q. How is your opinion with regard to that from your acquaintance with 
the denominations out of Boston and with the clergymen out of Boston ? 



APPENDIX. 95 

A. I am not much acquainted with the different denominations. With 
my own I think there is not the same interest felt on the subject that there 
was fifteen or twenty years ago. 

Q. Supposing that there were a proper license law, by which the .sale 
should be regulated and controlled, and the present law left in force to break 
up unlicensed places, would there come to the cause of temperance, in your 
judgment, a moral support and aid from the religious portion of the commu- 
nity to which you allude ? 

A. I think there would. 

Q. I understand your opinion to be that some law of this kind would be 
better than the present prohibitory law ? 

A. Yes, sir ; that is my opinion. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Is the general tenor of your answers based upon 
the doctrine of total abstinence or of moderate use ? 

A. It is not based upon the doctrine of total abstinence as a necessity for 
any individual. 

Q. Nor as a duty ? 

A. Nor as a duty. 

Q. Do you recognize no duty to abstain from liquors as a beverage, with 
reference to the general public welfare, unless the drinking of a glass is a sin 
per se f 

A. My own opinion in reference to that matter is, that the motive of 
doing good to our fellow-men, and of saving souls, in consequence of what has 
been done for us, is a thousand times more effectual than any prohibitory law 
can possibly be. 

Q. Do you take the ground that the individual physical good of a man in 
health requires alcoholic beverages ? 

A. No, sir ; I have nothing to do with that. 

Q. Do you mean that you reject that doctrine ? 

A. No, sir; I do not know anything at all about it. That is a subject 
that physicians could testify to better than I could. 

Q. You neither affirm nor deny the utility of alcoholic beverages to a man 
in health ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you recognize an indescribable amount of misery as growing from 
the use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A . I do not ; that is, if I understand your question. If you put in this way ; 
do you recognize a great amount of misery as growing from the intemperate 
and excessive use of intoxicating liquors as a beverage ? — I should say yes. 

Q. Then since you do admit an indescribable amount of misery as arising 
from the intemperate use of liquors, and since you are not prepared to affirm 
the utility of their use as a beverage, why do you plead here for a license 
law as against prohibition ? 

A. Because I think it is a great deal better for the end to be accom- 
plished. I mean to say that your prohibition only increases the evil ; it leads 
to more drinking, and demoralizes the community on the question of drunk- 
enness as a sin. Drunkenness is not the worst of all crimes nor the fountain of 
all sins. I doubt if it is as demoralizing as the selling of bad books or the 
\r* f bad sermons. 



96 APPENDIX. 

Q. Now might it not be that the disseminating of bad literature, or indeed 
the preaching of bad sermons, would have the same effect ? 

A. A sermon that denies the accountability of man and a future judg- 
ment, is a very bad sermon, and saps the foundation of all religion. 

Q. Will you explain the platform of the time you speak of. 

A. I suppose it was a platform by which individuals made a pledge or 
promise to abstain from the use of ardent spirits as a beverage. 

Q. It permitted the drinking of fermented liquors, did it not ? 

A. Yes, sir; and at the same time the enforcement of the pledge was 
based upon moral and religious considerations. 

Q. Have you or your brethren ever been engaged in any other temperance 
movement than that ? 

A. Well, sir, I cannot speak of my brethren. I can speak for myself in 
reference to that matter. I have never advocated it upon any other ground 
than that of abstinence. 

Q. You have never been engaged with the temperance movement as that 
cause has been denned and generally understood for the last thirty years ? 

A . No, sir ; I have not. 

Q. I understand you that your people were heartily engaged then in the 
temperance movement. Do you recollect a period at any time when the 
leading families of your church did not have liquors on their sideboard ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I do not think the leading families had it on their tables 
then. I am sure they do not now. 

Q. Do you remember any period thirty-five years ago, or at any other 
time, when the leading families of your communion did not use liquors and 
have them in their sideboard ? 

A. I should say that my own impression is, that the cause of temperance 
was very much thrown back by the extreme measures taken by temperance 
men at that time. When the temperance reformation commenced, undoubt- 
edly the drinking habits of the community were very universal, and liquor 
was more or less upon the sideboards everywhere. 

Q. And that was the case among the leading families of your communion 
thirty years ago ? 

A. I can hardly say that. But as early as 1835 there had been a vast 
change produced. 

Q. Do you mean to say that there is more liquor drank among the leading 
families of your communion than there was thirty years ago ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think it is so. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You give as a reason against the law, that when it 
came into politics, which is, I suppose, when they began to get it into the 
legislature, the interests of the clergy subsided. Do you remember any time 
when it was not known in the elections what sort of a law was favored, and 
when people were not elected on the question as to whether they were right 
on this subject ? 

A. I have really very little recollection about that subject, being very 
little of a politician myself. 

Q. In the early portions of the temperance movement, you state that the 
ministers of the various denominations aided largely in the advancement of 



APPENDIX. 97 

the cause, but that there has been a demoralization since the enactment of 
the prohibitory law ? 

A. I think that is so. 

Q. Are you aware of the position held by the Methodist clergy upon this 
subject? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you know whether they are for or against the prohibitory law ? 

A. No, sir; I do not know. 

Q. How do you state, then, in reference to the opinions of the clergy ? 

A. I speak merely of my impression. I occasionally meet clergymen of 
the other denominations, and I scarcely ever meet any among them who do 
not occasionally drink a glass of wine ; and I do not think they are gener- 
ally in favor of an extreme prohibitory law. 

Q. Do I understand you that you do not desire to see the sale of liquor 
suppressed ? 

A. I did not say that. That is a matter for the legislature to determine. 
I would not have it suppressed by an improper law, because the effect of 
such a law would be a great deal more of an injury than the sale. 

Q. How? 

A. By the demoralization of mankind. 

Q. You think the operation of the present law would be to demoralize 
mankind ? 

A. The question is, whether I believe that the successful execution of the 
present prohibitory law to suppress drunkenness would still demoralize the 
community in its operation. It is a question involving a just discrimination. 
As I said before, if you were to ask the question in reference to any other 
impossible thing, it would be precisely the same. You ask me if the success- 
ful execution of the prohibitory liquor law suppressing drunkenness would 
demoralize the community. In the first place, I take the ground that it can- 
not be successfully executed, and, therefore, I cannot answer your question. 

Q. Then, do you hope, through the license law, to suppress drunkenness ? 

A, I cannot say that I do ; I cannot suppose it. I believe that the law of 
the gospel and love of the gospel will do a thousand times more than all the 
laws of the State that can be formed. 

Q. You do not rely upon the law, then, to aid temperance or suppress 
intemperance ? 

A. As one instrument. I have no doubt that there ought to be a license 
law regulating the sale, and so far I should depend upon the law ; but when 
you depend upon the law for the cure of this evil entirely, and for the sup- 
pression of drunkenness, I think it is impossible. 

Q. Do I understand you to admit the exigency of any law, whether of 
the prohibitory law in its present form, or of the license law, as an auxiliary 
of the suppression of intemperance ? 

A. I certainly do. 

Q. But yon would prefer the license system ? 

A. I think it would be something better suited to the end desired. 

Q. Why? 

A. Because it is based on the good sense of the community. 
13 



98 APPENDIX. 

Testimony of Rev. John Power. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Be kind enough to state to the Committee what 
is your profession and where it is pursued ? 

A. I am a Catholic priest, a pastor of a church in Worcester ; pastor also 
of another church in Millbury, and of another in Grafton. 

Q. Alone, or with assistance ? 

A. With one assistant — my brother. 

Q. How long have you lived in Worcester ? 

A. Ten years. 

Q. In the pursuit of your ministry, have you had any opportunity to form 
an opinion concerning the effect of the existing legislation of Massachusetts 
upon the temperance or intemperance of the people ? If so, please to state 
what that opinion is ? 

A. I have had an opportunity to form an opinion on that subject, and 
have, at present, an absolute opinion. That is, I can state the present facts 
and their circumstances and bearings ; but I could scarcely tell of them in 
comparison with the effects under the legislation of twenty or thirty, or even 
fifteen years ago. 

Q. What is the aggregate population of the churches which come within 
your cure ? 

A. Our churches are not divided geographically. There are something 
like eleven or twelve thousand souls in Worcester. I have a parish of 
probably two thousand in Millbury, and in Grafton some twelve hundred. 

Q. Be kind enough to give to the Committee those positive facts, so far as 
you possess them, and your opinions as you have formed them ? 

A . I will begin by admitting that drunkenness is a great evil. Also, at 
the same time, that I think it is on the increase ; also, that one of the reasons 
why it is on the increase is from the fact that liquor is obtained in places and 
in a manner that would rather gratify a man's feeling for breaking the law. 
I have seen times and places, I think, when laws were broken for the sake of 
breaking them, to show a man's independence. I should also begin by stating 
that I am a temperance man. As a priest, I am obliged to preach temperance 
doctrines, and always have done so. I have also delivered temperance addresses 
before societies. But I make a wide distinction between temperance and total 
abstinence. I wish that distinction to be borne in mind decidedly. I should, 
by no means, wish to be considered as testifying for the rum side of the ques- 
tion. I use that expression, because it gives the idea I wish to convey in one 
word. I say that in my opinion — and I am but a young man and have not 
had much experience — this drawing a right line between temperance, as I 
understand it, and total abstinence, has been the cause of throwing out a 
great many friends from the temperance cause. I do not think that man a 
temperance man who totally abstains from the use of liquor. I think he 
should be called a total abstinence man. I think a man has a right to judge 
for himself. But, at the same time, I would say that, though I drink liquor, I 
still call myself a temperance man, if I do not exceed the bounds of modera- 
tion. I think the community feel that a law which tells a man that he shall 
not sell, is an unjust attempt to control him. I call it despotism. If I were a 
legislator, I should throw my vote against such a law as the present one, on 



APPENDIX. 99 

the ground that I had no right, as a legislator, to impose a law upon a man or 
a community that would take away certain rights which should not be taken 
away. As a citizen or an individual, I have a right to sell or drink, limited 
by the bounds of moderation. I have no right to sell or drink beyond the 
bounds of moderation. Up to that point, I think no one can interfere with 
my rights, without playing the part of a despot. 

Q. What have you observed to be the moral effect of this legislation upon 
the people of your charge ? And I will take the great body of people in 
humble life and of the least education, and therefore those most likely to be 
misled ? 

A. At the same time, you will not oblige me to throw out those who are 
not of my charge ? 

Q. It covers those who are not of your flock as well as them, does it not ? 

A. My opinion of this legislation is that, it being an infringement upon a 
man's right and liberty, men will openly violate the law almost for the sake of 
the pleasure of doing so. When they are told they cannot drink when they 
arc dry, they feel that they have a right to drink or not, if they see fit. 
Therefore, when the law undertakes to say they shall not drink, they say they 
will drink. Moreover, the legislation now not allowing even respectable 
places to keep liquors, the consequence is that liquors are obtained in private, 
of that quality and in that manner that very sad consequences do and must 
flow therefrom. I have known cases where men have gone into certain 
places where liquor was sold, with a wallet, and, depositing an amount there, 
they said, — I wish to drink that much. The person would be kept there, 
through drunkenness and sobriety, sobriety and drunkenness, until the money 
was expended. They would not go out of the place, because they would be 
arrested. And it is oftentimes the case (and I think this is something which 
frequently happens) that a man will take a drink, when he goes into a place 
where the sale is not licensed, and he will take not only one drink, but he 
takes a second and third drink, thinking that he may not get another glass so 
easy elsewhere. The consequence is that the man may finish off and be 
drunk on the spot, whereas he might have left a licensed place without being 
drunk. This I merely give as a thought or opinion. I should say, also, that 
in my experience abroad — and I was three years in France, in the midst of 
a wine country, where wine, I may almost say, was as abundant as water, and 
where I have even known masons to mix their mortar with it — I never saw a 
man drunk. A bottle only cost three pennies, and everybody drank it. I 
have found that where wine was drunk hard liquors are not much drunk ; it is 
wine exclusively. I also think (if you will allow me to say) that if this 
country were a vine-growing country it would be a more temperate country. 
These are facts in my experience of which I speak emphatically. I have 
never seen the taste for distilled spirits exist together with a taste for wines. 
I did not know a gallon or half a gallon of hard liquors to be drank during 
my visit in France during those three years. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You spoke of your numerous flock. Is there 
much intemperance among them ? 



100 APPENDIX. 

A. The term temperate is a difficult one to define. The majority of my 
parish are Canadians or French. The Worcester Parish is largely Irish, 
or of their descendants. 

Q. You give as a reason for opposing the present law that when a man is 
forbidden to do a thing he will do it the more for that reason ? 

A. If there were no law there would be no sin. 

Q. Then it was a mistake in uttering the ten commandments ? 

A. No, sir; it was the violation of that law that produced it. 

Q. Would you dispense with all law because when men are forbidden to 
do a thing therefore they do it ? 

A . No, sir ; but I would take care to be on the safe side of the offence. 
I would not forbid a man to do that which I knew he had an inherent right to 
do. That I believe to be the fact with respect to the prohibitory law. 

Q. You believe we have no right to make such a law ? 

A. I believe you have no right to make such laws with the intention which 
you have. I believe that you have no right to tell me whether or not I shall 
drink tea or coffee or wine, or to tell me that I shall not sell them. 

Q. Do you not know that the Supreme Court of the United States is the 
final arbiter on this subject ? And do you not know that the Supreme Court 
of the United States and the Supreme Court of Massachusetts have said 
that we have a right to make such a law ? 

A. Very good, sir; while the law exists; but I say that we are laboring 
to change that law. You have no right to make that law. In courts of 
legislation a bare majority makes a law. That does not make it a right law. 

Q. Who is to decide what sort of laws we have a right to make unless it 
is the courts ? 

A. The courts and conscience. The simple law does not carry always 
with it right. It carries with it a legal right ; but not a moral right. I allow 
you that the legislature may have a legal right, but not a moral right. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you ask for a license law ? 

A. Before that series of questions begins, I will say that I would not un- 
dertake to say just what kind of a law I would have. If you will be satisfied 
with a simple yes in answer to that question, I would say yes. 

Q. A license prohibits a great majority ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you believe there is a moral right to prohibit ninety-nine in a 
hundred ? 

A. I do, sir ; therefore I say you have a right to regulate, and to make a 
proper sale. 

Q. Then you would license ? 

A. I would license. 

Q. And you would claim that every good man has a right to be licensed ? 

A. So far as the necessities of the case require. 

Q. But the inherent right of sale was the point ? 

A. Yes, sir; every good man has a right to sell it. I understand the 
word goodness in the sense that he sells it according to law. 

Q. The point is as to the inherent right of preventing him from selling, 
if you permit somebody else ? Why do you object to the existing laws ? 



APPENDIX. 101 

A. Because the existing law takes away his right entirely. We are all 
put upon the same ground. 

Q. Then your license law fails from the same principle ? 

A. No, sir. There is in every community an inherent right to sell whis- 
koy, wine, alo, rum, gin, beef, butter, or sugar, and those not only for medi- 
cinal purposes, but for all purposes. And when you say that only one man 
in fifty, or two in a hundred shall sell, you are governed by the necessities of 
the case, in order that you may supply a reasonable demand. You may take 
away the right from every forty-nine, or every ninety-eight, not because you 
take away any right from them, but because they do not exercise the right in 
a proper manner. By putting in the hands of proper persons, you hold them 
responsible for every drinking person in the place. 

Q. While in France, were you in the habit of being among the people, or 
were you in school or college ? 

A. I spent all my vacations (three or four months in each year) among 
the people. 

Q. Do you testify that according to your observation no strong drinks 
were used there ? 

A. Yes, sir; I did not see more than three or four persons intoxicated. I 
recollect once, at carnival time, I did see a number of persons in a cart who 
were shouting pretty loudly, and seemed to be intoxicated ; but I do not 
know that they were really under the influence of liquor. 

Q. Did your rambles extend beyond the walls of Paris ? 

A. Oh, yes, sir; and I also visited the south of France. 

Q. Is it not well understood that brandy is extensively used in France ? 

A. No, sir ; I deny the assertion. 

Q, (By Mr. Spooner.) Did you never go outside the wall of Paris when 
you would be likely to see a pretty free use of spirits ? And do you not know 
that it is the habit of the people of Paris, to go outside of the walls of 
the city on Sunday and drink liquor there, because they can buy it there 
much cheaper ? 

A. No, sir; and, besides that, I would never allow that Paris is a sample 
of France. I should take Lyons, or some other of the large cities of France. 
Paris is a representative of all nations. Paris is a cosmopolitan city. Paris 
may be called the hotel of France 

Testimony of Rev. Thomas Sheahan. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you a clergyman of the Catholic Church ? 

A . I am. 

Q. You pursue your vocation in Taunton ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. How long have you been there ? 

A. Only two years. 

Q. How long in the Commonwealth ? 

A . I am a clergyman for the last seventeen years. 

Q. Be kind enough to state briefly to the Committee the result of your 
observation as to the working of the present liquor law among the people, 
in reference to restraining drunkenness ? 



102 APPENDIX. 

A. In reply, I would state that in Salem, where I passed fifteen years, I 
endeavored, as far as lay in my power, of putting down rum-selling, making 
use sometimes, of rather arbitrary means, perhaps. I did it, not so much 
that I am a teetotaler, but in view of the evils of intemperance as they 
existed. I was quite successful until the passage of the present law. I then 
left .off my efforts. I found that the prohibitory law increased drinking 
greatly, and that people who before abstained, on account of the law, and in 
opposition to the law, would drink. 

Q. Then you mean to say that the attempt of the law to prohibit by law 
has weakened the influence and moral power of the clergy over the people ? 

A. I do, most decidedly. I found my efforts were not so successful as 
before, although I do not mean to say that drinking prevailed to a great 
extent before. But, nevertheless, it was not as easy to control it as before. 

Q. How is it where you now live ? 

A. 1 am not so well acquainted there, and consequently cannot so well 
speak of it. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Is the prevalence of drinking there as great as you 
have usually met, in communities where you have observed ? 

A. I cannot institute any comparisons. I shall not answer any question 
of that kind. 

Q. How long have you been there ? 

A. Two years. 

Q. I ask my question in a general manner. Is drinking greatly prevalent 
there, or is it greatly suppressed there ? 

A. I have not been there long enough to be prepared to answer. 

Testimony of Rev. Robert Brady. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are a priest of the Catholic Church ? 

A. I am. I am pastor of St. Mary's Church, down in the neighborhood 
of Charlestown Bridge, on Endicott Street. 

Q. How long have you been in that vocation ? 

A. Ten years, next July. 

Q. In this city ? 

A. No, sir. I have been in this city four years. 

Q. Were you before that in this Commonwealth ? 

A. No, sir ; I was not. 

Q. Be kind enough to state to the Committee any facts and any opinions 
which you may have formed touching the operation and effects of the law 
respecting the sale of liquor and the habits of the people as to temperance ? 

A. The amount of intemperance I have seen is as great now as before, I 
think. I have seen no benefit from the operation of the law. I think that in 
other respects there has been a demoralization ; because instead of having 
liquor in several places, as before, th^ number of places is increased, and the 
condition of the places is much worse. You can get it in almost every place. 
They keep it in cellars, and in milk cans, and in almost every possible way. 
And I think the quality of the liquor is worse. 

Q. It drives the trade from the surface, and makes it a contraband and 
furtive one ? 



APPENDIX. 103 

A. That is my idea of it, sir. 

Q. Are there any advantages, which you have been able to observe, from 
the exercise of a moral and religious influence over the people ? 

A. I have always believed, and believe now, that the only way to get at 
this temperance reform is by moral suasion. 

Q. Have you had any experience in that ? 

A . Yes, I have known many persons improved by moral suasion, and not 
by the prohibitory law. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Has there been an increase of the sale of liquors 
within the limits of your parish, for the last three or four years ? 

A. I cannot tell positively. My impression is, that the number of places 
where liquor is sold has increased. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) In speaking of promoting the temperance cause, 
precisely what do you speak of? 

A . Precisely what Mr. Power spoke of. I understand the moderate use 
of liquors to be no sin. 

Q. What you seek among your people, by moral suasion or otherwise, is 
to promote their moderate use ? 

A . No. To promote temperance. There are some cases of persons who 
cannot use liquors temperately, and with those who cannot use them temper- 
ately, I use moral suasion to hinder from drinking. I think I have no 
right, if they can use liquors moderately, to say that they shall not use it. 

Q. That is the general view of your clergy ? 

A. It is. 

Q. Do you know any exception to that view among your clergy ? 

A. I do not know of any. 

Testimony of Kev. Lawrence McMahon. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you a priest of the Koman Church ? 

A. I am, in New Bedford. 

Q. How long have you lived in New Bedford ? 

A. Since the first of January, 1865. 

Q. How long have you been a priest in Massachusetts ? 

A. Since I took orders ; seven years. 

Q. Where did you live before you went to New Bedford ? 

A. I was placed about two years in the household of Bishop Fitzpatrick. 
I then went to the army and stayed about twelve months till I broke down. 
I then went to Bridgewater and was there about fourteen or fifteen months, 
and from there I went to New Bedford. 

Q. Be kind enough to state to the Committee the result of your observa- 
tion of the prohibitory law upon the habits of the people, in respect to drunk- 
enness ? 

A. I do not think it checks drunkenness, so far as my observation extends. 
I do not believe it does at all. I know that now in New Bedford — and New 
Bedford is a moral city, comparatively — anybody who wishes to get liquor 
there, can do it without any trouble whatsoever. I see people drunk on the 
street frequently, and I know they can get it. 

Q, (By Mr. Miner.) Do you deem that a matter of regret ? 



104 APPENDIX. 

A. I do ; that they are drunk, certainly. 

Q. And that they can get the liquor ? 

A. I do ; that those who abuse it can get it so easily. I do not know that 
it is that those who use it properly can get it. 

Q. Have you any plan to prevent it ? 

A. Yes. We have two temperance societies there ; and I believe they 
have done more to promote temperance than all the constables in Bristol 
County. 

Q. What is the character of the pledge ? 

A. If a man comes to me, I give him the pledge, if he is in danger from 
drinking. 

Q. Is your society based on the doctrine of total abstinence ? 

A. Yes ; and they are expelled if they break over. It is emphatically a 
total abstinence society. 

Q. Those people who can be trusted to. drink moderately, do not join your 
society ? 

A. There are some men who, I think, cannot drink moderately, and whom 
I recommend to be total abstinence men. They are not all topers. 

Q. Do the leading men of your communion join the temperance societies ? 

A. I do not know how they stand, and if I did I should not wish to tell. 

Q. Are you a member of that society ? 

A . I am not. 

Q. Do you propose by a license law to put the attainment of liquor beyond 
the reach of any portion of the community ? 

A. I believe in a license law in general ; but the matters of detail I have 
not arranged. 

Q. Do you see any principles in the prohibition of the sale of liquors, from 
which so much evil comes, different from the prohibition of other vices ? 

A. I do. There is a difference in regard to theft, lying, and blasphemy. 
There is no moderation in theft. But to take one glass of wine, I never knew 
to be a crime ; nor has it been so considered by Mohamedan, Greek or Jew, 
from Plato down to the present time. 

Q. Do you recognize it to be a duty obligatory upon a Christian to forego 
for himself any personal good, when by so doing he can greatly promote the 
public good ? 

A. I understand what you are driving at. In the first place, I would not 
admit that this promotes the public good. I do not think a man is bound, as 
you put it, not to do so. 

Q. Do you think the paying of money from your pocket to repair the 
ravages of drunkenness and crime, is a foregoing of personal good for a public 
good ? 

A. That is a question of taxation and political economy. 

Q. Do you protest against the right ? 

A . No. I always pay what I am called upon to pay. 

Q. Have you any doubt of the right of the State to support the poor by a 
tax on the personal earnings of others ? 

A. It seems to me these questions are intended to be captious rather than 
to draw out the truth. 



APPENDIX. 105 

Q. I am exceedingly unfortunate in the objections to my questions. Is 
the right to sell or to drink any stronger than the right to hold one's earn- 
ings ? And when the government takes the earnings of a man to repair the 
ravages of intemperance, does it not infringe one's private rights as directly 
as when it prohibits the right of a man to sell liquor ? 

A. When the liquor law abolishes all laws to support paupers, and it is 
found better than a license law, I will answer the question. But I don't 
think there will be any more paupers to support under a license law than 
under the present law. 

Testimony of Kev. Manassas Doherty. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you a priest of the Catholic Church ? 

A. I am, — in Cambridge. 

Q. How long have you been a resident of Massachusetts and in the 
performance of clerical duties ? 

A. Since May, 1844. 

Q. How long have you lived in Cambridge ? 

A. All that time, in Cambridge or East Cambridge. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state your views, assuming I have put the 
same questions to you that I did to the gentleman who last preceded you ? 

A. As you have summed up the question, I will also sum up my answer; 
and I will give the answers of the reverend gentlemen who have pre- 
ceded me, particularly those of Rev. Mr. Power, of Worcester. 

Q. You concur with what he said ? 

A. I do. 

Q. What has been the result of your own observation ? 

A. I do not really think that the amount of drinking among the class of 
people to whom I minister has been either increased or diminished by legisla- 
tion. The first year that I came to America, in 1837, I do believe there was 
as much intemperance among the class of people to whom I minister as there 
is now, keeping in view the amount of population. I believe that at certain 
times, however, intemperance may have increased, owing to particular causes, 
from excitement. For instance, at the time of recruiting, I found there was 
a great deal of intemperance, more than at any other period that I remember 
since I entered the ministry of my church. I have nothing to say with regard 
to the law. I believe its results are not going to be productive of the benefits 
which the framers of the law intended. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you agree with Rev. Mr. Power in relation to 
the position of your clergy on the question of moderate drinking as the true 
temperance doctrine ? 

A. I do. By way of explanation, I should also remark that I do not take 
any spirituous liquors myself. Not because I think a moderate use of it is an 
evil, but I do not take it for a sanitary reason. But I agree with Rev. Mr. 
Power and the other gentlemen of my denomination who have preceded me. 

Adjourned. 

14 



106 APPENDIX. 



FIFTH DAY. 

Wednesday, Feb. 27, 1867. 
The Committee met at 9 o'clock, and the hearing of evidence was resumed. 

Testimony of Rev. John P. Robinson. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Will you be kind enough to state your residence 
and duties ? 

A. My residence, sir, is in the city of Boston, No. 67 Bedford Street. My 
church is the free church of Saint Mary's for sailors, on Richmond Street. 

Q. How extensive is your connection with the people, especially of the 
lower and poorer classes of the people in that part of the city ? 

A. My connection with the people is throughout the city, but my particu- 
lar labors would be confined chiefly to the North End. 

Q. How long have you been so employed ? 

A. I have entered upon my twenty-third year of work in this position. 

Q. How extensively do your duties and position bring you in contact with 
the people, so as to furnish observation as to the state of the poorer classes ? 

A. I think, sir, as generally as almost any other clergyman in the city of 
Boston. I occupy, sir, relatively, now (having from necessity been so long 
in the same position,) the same position at the North End, that my excellent 
brother, Mr. Wells, does at the South End. 

Q. What has your observation been for the last ten or fifteen years in 
regard to the progress of intemperance ? 

A. I think I can say, without any hesitation, that there has been an 
increase, a very considerable increase in that time ; probably from the increase 
of foreign population among us, and from their congregating more generally 
to that part of the city. 

Q. Have you observed in regard to intemperance, how general it is with 
regard to the different members of the same family ? 

A . I am sorry to say that I find it now more noticeable among the differ- 
ent members of the family, not only with the father and mother, but fre- 
quently with the children. It is not an uncommon thing to find girls and 
boys from twelve to fourteen years of age, under the influence of liquor. 
Very often among those who come to see me I observe it from their breath ; 
and they may tell me that they have taken it, probably for some cold or pain. 

Q. Is that feature more modern ? 

A . I think it is, sir. I think a few years ago the intemperance was con- 
fined to the father and mother, or adults. It was comparatively rare fifteen 
years ago to find a drunken child at the North End. Even children of the 
foreign population were comparatively free from that vice. 

Q. Has there been any change in the mode of getting liquor, or in places 
of keeping it, which tends to produce this result ? 



APPENDIX. 107 

A. There has been a very decided change within the last two or three 
years, and probably within the last five years. 

Q. What is it, sir ? 

A. The liquor is now found in a great many of the cellars and basement 
rooms and the attics, at the North End. There are very few places where a 
person who wants it, cannot find it. You will not see it when you go in, but 
you will smell it, and if you want it you can find it. 

Q. In your opinion, has there been considerable increase ? 

A. I have no question, sir, that it has increased five per cent., as regards 
the habit of drinking among women and men and children at the North End. 
We have known instances where children have received a glass of liquor for 
going for liquor for others, being compensated, not by a penny, but from the 
liquor itself. 

Q. What should you say as to the increase or diminution of the sale of 
liquor in this way ? 

A. I think it has been quite in proportion to the closing of the other 
places ; and I think there are quite as many facilities for obtaining liquor 
now, as there were when there were licenses for the public sale. 

Q. Then, if the public places were closed, would it, in your opinion, have 
any effect in diminishing the number of places, or would it increase the 
number of places where these people can get liquor ? 

A. If the public sale is closed, I think it would stop drinking among stran- 
gers, but I do not think it would have any effect at all upon those who are 
residents of the city, and are in the habit of drinking, and are in the habit of 
getting it as they want it. There are certain ways that men can get it, and 
their friends soon find out where they can buy it. 

. Q. I would inquire if you have formed any opinion of the effect of the 
existing prohibitory law, in regard to the progress of intemperance ? 

A. I have not, sir, beyond the facts that I have stated. I, myself, sir, if 
there could be a prohibitory law in effect, should be very glad to see it. I 
was very earnest myself in the beginning of this movement, and was ready to 
do anything that would banish this evil ; but I am satisfied that it never can 
be accomplished by a prohibitory law. I may be mistaken, but I have given a 
great deal of thought to the subject, and have had a good deal of observation 
in reference to it ; and I have held such a position that the subject has always 
been before me. 

Q. Have you formed any impression or any opinion from your peculiar 
field of observation, as to any other system of legislation that might be more 
productive in aiding the friends of temperance in promoting their objects V 

A. I have, sir ; I have often referred with a great deal of satisfaction to 
the time when we had a license law in the State. We felt the force of that 
law at the North End. We saw its good effect during the week days, and we 
derived a great comfort from its enforcement on Sunday. 

Q, How is the prohibitory law enforced on Sunday in these furtive places ? 
Is it enforced there any at all ? 

A. I do not suppose that it would be possible to reach these places. 

Q. Have these places seemed to increase more rapidly within the last four 
or five months ? 



108 APPENDIX. 

A. I cannot say within the last four or five months; but within the last 
few years there has been a gradual increase all the time. We might find 
cases where we do not expect it. 

Q. Suppose that a law should be enacted giving to the mayor and alder- 
men the power of licensing or not, and placing the responsibility in their 
hands, making licensed places responsible to the mayor and aldermen, and 
leaving the Maine Law in full force ; what would be the effect of such an 
instrumentality fully administered ? 

A. I think it would have a very beneficial influence. It would reach 
places that are not reached now, and which could not be reached by the 
present law. 

Q. You speak of the difficulty strangers may have now in getting liquor. 
If you had a license law would you or not exclude the public bar ? 

A. I certainly should, sir. By public bars, I mean all places such as 
saloons where liquor is sold. 

Q. The denomination with which you are connected is what, sir ? 

A. The Episcopal Church. 

Q. How is the fact as to the members of the clergy and the influential 
members of the church, in regard to withholding active co-operation with the 
temperance men now, compared with what it was under the other system ? 

A. I am hardly prepared to answer that question. I only know of my 
own personal feeling and action. I believe that all the clergy are in favor of 
the temperance movement. Some are not in favor of the present law. My 
feelings have been strongly in its favor, until I found we could not reach the 
point that we aimed at. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that you have often had occasion to 
refer with pleasure to the time when the license law was in full operation ; 
what year was this ? 

A. Well, I do not know, sir, that I can tell you what year ; it was during 
the administration of Mayor Quincy. 

Q. Which Mr. Quincy? 

A. Josiah Quincy, Jr. 

Q. What did he do under that law ? 

A. As to that, I only judge from the operation of the law at that time, 
particularly as to the closing of the shops on Sunday. We had but little 
sale there, except occasionally, although it has always been sold ; if not in 
public places, yet it was sold in private places. 

Q. Who were licensed at that time ? 

A. Well, I do not know that I can answer that question, even. 

Q. Do you know that anybody was licensed ? 

A. Well, I do not think that I could refer to any fact of the case. 

Q. Supposing that I should tell you that Mr. Quincy never gave a 
license ? 

A. Then, sir, I should admit that I was mistaken in what I supposed. 

Q. You say that your clergy are strongly in favor of the cause of tem- 
perance ? 

A. So far as I know, sir, they are. I do not know to the contrary. 



APPENDIX. 109 

Q. What are their views as regards temperance ; as to the total abstinence 
from the use of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, and as to the use of them 
in moderation ? 

A. Well, I suppose that question I could not answer fully. Many of 
them I know are in favor of entire total abstinence. Probably a very fair 
proportion of the Episcopal clergy are in favor of it. 

Q. How is it as regards the Episcopal clergy of Boston ? 

A. That is a question I could not answer. I am not much acquainted 
with the clergy of Boston. I am chiefly confined to my work at the North 
End, and it is very much a personal work with me, and it does not involve so 
much attention among the other clergymen of my church. 

Q. Do you preach the doctrine of total abstinence ? 

A. Always, sir. We have two, and I may say three, temperance societies 
— one for boys, and one for men, and one for females. We preach the total 
abstinence principle among our poor people, and I have always inculcated 
that doctrine. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you use a pledge ? 

A. Yes, sir; we have a peculiar pledge among the "cold water boys." 
They have a peculiar organization, and they meet once a week in the base- 
ment of our church. In the female society, I presume they have the same 
pledge, as most of the teachers are engaged in both societies. I do not have 
so much to do with the latter society. 

Q. What is this pledge that you speak of? 

A. It is a total abstinence pledge. 

Q. Is your name enrolled with them ? 

A. Not with them; but it is with the early portions of that movement. 

Q. Do you regard yourself as pledged against the use of intoxicating 
liquors ? 

A. Well, I am not and never have been a drinking man at any period of 
my life. 1 have no fondness for making liquor an occasional drink. If I 
found that I had occasion for it, I should take it as I should take anything 
else. 

Q. You do not regard yourself, then, as a clergyman, pledged to total 
abstinence ? 

A. I do not regard myself, as a clergyman, pledged to abstain totally. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What kind of a license law are you in favor of? 

A. I am in favor of any law that will break up the usage of drinking. 

Q. You would favor the law as it was under the administration of Mr. 
Quincy ? 

A. So far as my recollection extends at that time, I think we had less of 
it then than we had at any time since. 

Q. You speak of the increase of the traffic, and say that it has been fully 
five per cent. ? 

A. Well, sir, I would say it was fully as much. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How are you able to make so fine a calculation ? 
A. Well, sir, I am speaking within bounds. 

Q. You speak of your brethren being laborers in the temperance move- 
ment ; do you use the phrase " temperance movement " advisedly ? 



110 APPENDIX. 

A. I do not know that I understand your question. 

Q. Speaking in general of the temperance reform ; we take it when speak- 
ing of temperance, that total abstinence is meant. Do you take it that 
the clergymen generally are in favor of the total abstinence movement ? 

A. No, sir ; it is not my impression that the clergy in general are in favor 
of that movement. 

Q. Are your clergymen, generally ? 

A. I do not know, sir ; I do not think that, as a body, they are. 

Q. Do you know of men among your clergy that are total abstinence men ? 

A. Yes, sir, I do. 

Q. Are you in the habit of meeting those among your clergymen who do 
not occasional take wine ? 

A. That is a question that I am not able to answer. 

Q. You speak of the increase of the population at the North End ; is it not 
the same true of Mr. Wells' vicinity ? 

A. I should suppose it was. 

Q. Do you know of any American families of any considerable standing 
in the neighborhood of Saint Stephen's House ? Is not the population entirely 
foreign ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think it is. 

Q. Is any admixture that remains of the poorer class of Americans ? 

A. I think there are still respectable families of Americans in that neigh- 
borhood. 

Q. Are you familiar with that locality ? 

A. So familiar that I am passing through there frequently. 

Q. You have no doubt that the general remark as to the North End, 
applies equally to that neighborhood ? 

A. I do not think it is to the same extent. 

Q. You speak of putting the administration of the liquor interest into 
the hands of the mayor and aldermen of the city of Boston. What 
action of the mayor and aldermen for the last twenty years, encourages you 
to repose confidence in that body of men, for the restriction of the liquor 
traffic ? 

A. Only that, sir, which we might hope to result from a stringent license 
system. 

Q. You have not any special confidence in that body, but would only 
expect good measures from common men in such a place ? 

A. Certainly, sir. 

Q. You speak of a stringent license system. How would you adjust a 
license law, that would prevent the selling of liquor in all parts of the city? 

A. I do not profess to be wise enough to provide such a law as would be 
required. 

Q. Is it not clear that if you license such a number of people in the neigh- 
borhood, there would be no restraint in the use of liquor in these places ? 

A. I do not think that would be the effect of the law. 

Q. What reason have you to think that the mayor and aldermen would 
not license in every part of the city when they have refused for fifteen years 
persistently to apply the existing law to the breaking down of the traffic ? 



APPENDIX. Ill 

A. I think I should have sufficient confidence in the manner in which a 
law of that kind would be carried out. I have no doubt that if we have a 
license law it will be so carefully guarded that there will not be much left 
for the mayor and aldermen to do. 

Testimony of Rev. William R. Alger. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside, and what are your peculiar 
duties ? 

A. My residence is 38 Temple Street, in the city of Boston. I am pastor 
of the society whose legal title is " The New North Religious Society of the 
town of Boston." 

Q. I would like to inquire of you, sir, so far as you have been able from 
your observation and peculiar duties to form an opinion, any opinion which 
you may have as to the effect of the present prohibitory laws, as regards 
extensive drinking in the community ? 

A . My opinion is, from the observation that has been within my reach, 
that the law is null and void ; that it has no effect at all in the city of Boston. 

Q. What is your observation as to the increase of intemperance in the city 
of Boston during the past ten or fifteen years ? 

A. I have very few data for forming opinions, but I have a strong impres- 
sion that intemperance has increased very much within the last six years. 
As to the last fifteen years, I know not. Within the last six years, I think 
intemperance has very much increased, though I think it has been very much 
the result of causes foreign to any legislation of any kind. 

Q. What opinion, if any, have you formed as regards any system of legis- 
lation upon this subject different from that at present ? 

A. My opinion, sir, is very clear that a judicious and stringent license 
law would be far preferable in its operation, and far more in its theoretical 
consistency with our institutions. 

Q. What is there in tins system that induces thinking men to abstain 
from co-operating with it ? 

A. I think, sir, that an act of legislation interfering with the private 
habits of individuals is contrary to the spirit and genius of American institu- 
tions ; that in a democratic' government the people should be left entirely free 
in everything that does not concern directly the laws that are instituted for 
the protection of property and life. And I think that every man who is not 
prejudiced by bias, who thinks carefully upon the history of legislation, will 
desire to see it limited to the utmost, and that it shall interfere as little as 
possible in every respect with the rights of the citizen, leaving everything that 
possibly can be left entirely to the people, especially in a democracy like our 
own. That is the ground on which my preference is expressed for a license 
system. If it is not improper, I should be glad to add that my feelings in 
regard to the subject of intemperance are well known. I am and always 
have been against it. I have had occasion to see something of the evils of 
intemperance ; but there are a thousand others existing against which no one 
would invoke legislation, and it seems to me that consistency does not require 
it here. 



112 APPENDIX. 

Q. Was there a time when clergymen and others were more engaged in 
the temperance reform than they are now ? 

A. I can hardly express an opinion on that subject; however, I should 
think that the clergymen are as much interested now as ever. 

Q. Are the clergymen and others that formerly co-operated in other tem- 
perance movements, inclined to take an active part in co-operating with this 
particular movement, with particular reference to the enforcement of the 
present law ? 

A. I should think that a great many are; and a considerable portion are 
not. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you speak generally, or with reference to your 
own brethren ? 

A. I speak generally, so far as my observation reaches. 

Q. Do you understand that the Methodist denomination are in favor of 
the present law ? 

A. I think they are unanimous in favor of the present system. 

Q. Do you know of any Congregationalist clergymen out of the city of 
Boston who are not in favor of this system ? 

A . I cannot say as to that, sir. 

Q. How is it as to the Congregationalist clergymen in this city ? Is not 
Mr. Hale in favor of it ? 

A . Yes, sir ; I think so. 

Q. Does not Mr. Gannett favor it ? 

A . I think he does. 

Q. Does not Mr. Hepworth favor it ? 

A. I do not know. I have a very distinct opinion that there are very 
many clergymen who would not labor for a prohibitory law, who would labor 
earnestly for temperance aside from legislation. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) By temperance you do not mean moderate 
drinking ? 

A. Sometimes the term may be used with different significations. There 
is a technical use of the word which restricts to entire abstinence. The word 
has fairly two meanings. 

Q. In which sense do you use the term ? 

A. I should use it in the sense of a moderate use of liquor. 

Q. Then you mean that those clergymen who favor the temperance move- 
ment labor in favor of a moderate use ? 

A. I do not mean that. When I speak of the effort of the clergymen, as 
regards temperance, I mean that they labor for temperance in the strict sense 
of the word. When you ask me if there are many clergymen who will 
refrain from active co-operation with the temperance movement on account 
of the prohibitory law, I mean then, in the sense of a moderate use of 
liquors. 

Q. You speak of the increase of intemperance within the last six years. 
Does that cover your experience in Boston ? 

A. I have been here twelve years. 

Q. Do you speak of your own acquaintance, or generally of the city ? 

A. Generally of the city. 



APPENDIX. 113 

Q. Is it true of your own parish ? 

A. I think it is not in my own parish. 

Q. How do you judge that it is true of the city at large ? 

A. I judge that the number of places in which liquor is sold has increased. 

Q. Are you aware how the number compares with the number of places 
before ? 

A. I cannot say as to that. 

Q. Are you aware what the assessors' returns and the State Constable's 
returns are ? 

A. I am not. 

Q. How are you able to gainsay the reports of these men ? 

A . I do not mean to affirm the fact to be either way, but to give my 
own opinion to you ; and I am willing to admit that my data are not very 
extensive. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you ever think that the existence of a war 
for four years had an unfavorable effect upon the cause of temperance ? 

A. I think that the influence of the war was very strong, and that it had 
an immense influence as regards the evils of intemperance. 

Q. Should you not think that was the principal cause ? 

A. Yes, sir, I should think it was. 

Q. Have you not noticed that respect for law generally has increased since 
the close of the war ? 

A. Yes, sir, I think it has. 

Q. Would you go so far as to say that we should have no law upon the 
subject'? 

A. It may be necessary to regulate without suspending the sale. One 
reason why I think that a license system would be better than a promiscuous 
sale is this : it seems to me that a license law, administered by intelligent 
and high-minded men, would limit the traffic in intoxicating liquors to a much 
more respectable class of persons, and that one consequence would be an 
improvement in the quality of the liquors. And I think that very much of the 
evil, arising from the use of intoxicating liquors, is produced by these poisons. 
One great improvement, I think, would be the giving of a very limited num- 
ber of licenses, and then securing some respectable and high-minded persons 
who will not adulterate and poison their liquors ; and, also, I would have them 
discriminate between the persons to whom they would sell. 

Q. Does your memory run back to the time when the license law was in 
effect ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You do not remember the fact that a large number of persons sold at 
that time without a license ? 

A. I am not acquainted with the fact. 

Testimony of Rev. George W. Blagden, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You. are one of the officiating clergymen at the 
Old South Church? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you resided in Boston ? 
15 



114 APPENDIX. 

A. About thirty-six years, sir ; not as pastor of that church all the while. 

Q. I would inquire, if from your sphere of observation you have been able 
to form a conclusion as to the progress of intemperance during the last ten or 
fifteen years, in this city ? 

A. I am not very familiarly acquainted with specific measures ; but my 
general impression, from the papers, and from what I have observed aside from 
reading, is that intemperance has increased within the last ten or fifteen years. 

Q. Have you been able to form opinions from your observation, and from 
your investigations, as to the comparative evil resulting from intemperance 
under the license system, and under the prohibitory system ? 

A. I have never liked the prohibitory system, because I think it takes 
away, in a degree, the condition of temperance. I am in the habit of saying 
that temperance is self-control in the use of everything ; but I do not think 
that there can be temperance where a person has to use a certain thing spec- 
ified. I cannot conceive of temperance where I have not the power to use. 

Q. What system do you think would be most preferable in Boston ? 

A. I have been in the habit of thinking that a license system was a better 
system. It puts the power of sale in the hands of gentlemen approved by 
the existing government of the city or the State, as the case might be ; and I 
think it would be much better to do that than it would to have a prohibitory 
law. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Will you be kind enough to state the grounds upon 
which you prefer a license law to a prohibitory law ? 

A. I think that it leaves the question of temperance more free to be exer- 
cised. I do not believe a man can be temperate where you prohibit the object 
in reference to which he is temperate. There is no temperance where you 
cannot use. If I have not a right to use, that is total abstinence ; but there 
is no temperance. 

Q. Do you mean to say there is no temperance without use ? 

A. There is no actual temperance without use. 

Q. Do you feel that you cannot apply the term of temperance to those of 
your brethren, or to those of the clergymen generally, who on principle 
constantly abstain from liquors as a beverage ? 

A. Why, no, sir ; they are temperate men, and I have never had a doubt 
that they were ; but the principle on which they are temperate, I might differ 
from them in stating. They should not be ministers if they are not temperate ; 
and I should feel bound to institute proceedings against them if they were 
not. 

Q. Would you say that there is temperance without use ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How do you account for that ? 

A. Because I must show I had the object in which I am temperate. 

Q. Then you prefer a license law to a prohibitory law because it favors 
the use of liquor moderately ? 

A. Because it favors the regulation of that which a man needs more or 
less for different purposes. 

Q. Including use. 

A. Including use, if he feel it his duty to use it. 



APPENDIX. 115 

Q. Use as a beverage ? 

A. I did not say beverage. I suppose that sometimes a person might want 
to use that which was intoxicating, although he did not use it as a beverage. 

Q. Do these various uses include his use as a beverage ? 

A. No, sir. I have never thought that intoxicating liquor was good as a 
beverage ; I have never supposed that use was temperance. 

Q. Well, sir, allow me to ask, if the license system, in your judgment, 
would tend more to the restriction of its use as a beverage than the prohibi- 
tory law ? 

A. I think so, from all that I read in the newspapers and hear. As I 
have already said, I have not many specific facts ; but I take the facts and 
impressions that I receive from the papers, and from those that I come in 
contact with. 

Q. Does your information come from religious or secular papers ? 

A. I read both, sir. 

Q. Will you name a religious paper in New England that objects to the 
prohibitory law ? 

A. I do not know of any that do. 

Q. Do you know of any secular paper in Boston that does favor the 
prohibitory law ? 

A . I do not know as to that. 

Q. Speaking of the great body of your own clergymen in the city and 
throughout New England, what is your impression ? 

A. I have an impression that most of the clergy of my own denomination 
would go for the prohibitory law. 

Q. Are there any in Boston who would not ? 

A. I do not know of any. 

Q. Are you sure that there is any clergyman of your own sect opposed to 
it out and out ? 

A. I have not conversed with them on the subject; I have an impression 
that there is at least one. 

Q. How many are there of your clergy in the city ? 

A. I should think there was somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen or 
twenty. 

Q. Do you know of any clergyman of your denomination, out of Boston, 
who stands, in your judgment, in a doubtful position on this subject ? 

A. I really do not know what you would mean by a " doubtful position." 

Q. Undeclared. 

A. I know nothing about it, except the impression I get from religious 
and secular papers ; and I have already said that the mass of Trinitarian 
Congregationalist clergymen throughout the Commonwealth would be for a 
prohibitory law. 

Q. How would it be with the communicants of your church in and out of 
Boston ? 

A . I do not know as to that ; I could not answer. 

Q. How is it out of Boston ? 

A . It has generally been represented that, out of the city, people are more 
for a prohibitory law than in Boston or in the large towns ; and that is all I 



116 APPENDIX. 

know. I think that, in a place like Boston, it is more difficult to carry out 
the system of prohibition than it is in smaller places. 

Q. What are the difficulties ? 

A. I should not be able to state them; there are many facilities for 
evading the law, and obtaining liquor in a city of this size. 

Q. The respectable men, church communicants, do not wish to evade the 
law? 

A. I do not speak of the communicants, but of people generally; and I 
was going to say, that this law also produces other evils, worse than intem- 
perance, by the surreptitious way in which liquor is obtained. 

Q. Then you are inclined to think that the surreptitious means by which 
this liquor is obtained is worse than intemperance ? 

A. I think there were some things connected with this surreptitious obtain- 
ing of liquor which were worse in their tendency than intemperance. 

Q. Would you like an open bar ? 

A. I should say that I should like a large liberty in the use of every com- 
bination of elements made by man, and each man using under God that 
which he feels that he ought to use or desires. I would prefer that a man 
should use that which he feels that he has a right to use, openly rather than 
surreptitiously. I think that whatever can be done openly and accountably 
to the opinions of our fellow men tends more to temperance than making a 
law which encourages the surreptitious use and sale of any article. 

Q. What do you think as to the licensed seller being influenced in the 
sales which he makes, from consideration of profits ? 

A. We are liable to have our hearts influenced by our views of our own 
interests, but not necessarily wrongly influenced. 

Q. That depends upon what the right and the wrong is, does it not ? 

A. Certainly. ♦ 

Q. Do I understand that, whatever law you had, you would desire that the 
law should operate to prevent the moderate use of liquors as beverages ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think I would say that. 

Q. If then, it should appear to the law officers, for example, that the 
existing prohibitory law is best fitted to do that work, you would prefer that ? 

A. I should very much prefer letting all combinations of elements be sold 
by those who found that there was a demand for them, rather than by laying 
any restrictions on them. My habit of thinking is that we should lessen the 
trade by lessening the -demand. 

Q. It seems to me that you have changed ground. This last proposition 
is upon the unrestricted sale. Do I understand that you are against all 
restrictions of the sale by law, of liquor as a beverage ? 

A. No, sir ; that is the reason why I think that the license system is a good 
one. 

Q. Then how do you say that you would have every man at liberty to sell 
whatever there was a demand for ? 

A. That does not exclude a judicious regulation. 

Q. Then why would you exclude ninety-nine out of every hundred from 
selling it, and yet allow the hundredth to sell it ? 

A. Because it might be expedient. 



APPENDIX. 117 

Testimony of Rev. Patrick Strain. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside, and what is your calling ? 

A. I am a Catholic priest; I reside in Lynn at present; I have had 
charge of the church in Lynn and Chelsea for the last six years. 

Q. In your experience, what has been the progress of intemperance 
during the last ten years ? 

A. I think, for the last ten years it has been slightly increasing in Chelsea 
and Lynn, although people have got along there, generally, pretty well. I 
think intemperance was somewhat increased there during the times of 
excitement. 

Q. Have you been able to form any opinion as to the present prohibitory 
system of legislation in regard to its checking the progress of intemperance ? 

A. I think it has done no good. I think the people generally do not 
respect it, nor has there been any liquor law respected by the people 
generally. 

Q. How is it as to the sale in public or clandestine places ? 

A. I think that, publicly, there are less sales ; but I think that for every 
place that is closec\ up there is one or more that takes the place of it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You do not attribute the increase to law or 
to no law ? 

A. No, sir; I would rather attribute the increase of it to the increase of 
money that was had. 

Q. From the cause of the war ? 

A. When there would be more money, there would be more drinking. 

Q. The general influence of the war was against temperance ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. I understand you to say that you do not believe that the law affected 
the sale and use of liquor favorably or unfavorably ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you in favor of a license law, particularly ? 

A. I have not given it much attention, but I think it would be an im- 
provement ? 

Q. Can you state the ground of that belief? 

A . I think that the prohibitory law makes people hypocrites and deceitful. 

Q, How so ? 

A. By pretending to be good people and not having it, and at the same 
time having it. 

Q. They could do that under any law, could they not ? 

A. With a license law, they could have better liquor. 

Q. They would drink it with some confidence, would they not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of George F. Bigelow, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You reside in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What relations and connections with the poor have you ? 



118 APPENDIX. 

A. I am secretary of the Howard Benevolent Society, and have been for 
the last ten years ; and I have been connected with the "Washingtonian Home, 
as its physician, for about eight years, though I am not now ; and for some 
years I was connected with the Boston Dispensary. 

Q. What has been your opportunity for observation as to the progress of 
intemperance within the last ten or fifteen years ? 

A. Within the last ten years, I should say that intemperance had 
increased in Boston. 

Q. What opinion have you as to the effect of the prohibitory law in that 
respect in the cause of temperance and for the prevention of drunkenness ? 

A. I should think, as I say, that it had increased under the operation of 
the prohibitory law. 

Q. Were you a member of the legislature when the law of 1855 was 
passed ? 

A. I voted for the law at that time, thinking it was desirable; and 
though it was not exactly what I desired, yet I thought it was the best thing 
that we could have, and I voted for it. My opinion has changed since that 
time, and has led me to believe that the license system would be preferable 
to any other form of prohibitory law that has existed sine 9 that time. 

Q. How is it as to the sale and the number of places in which liquor is 
sold? 

A. So far as my opportunities of judging are concerned, I should say the 
places where liquor was sold have increased very much in number. 

Q. What observation have you had in regard to the secresy of the sale 
and the number of clandestine places of sale ? 

A. I can only say, sir, that it is very rare that I have occasion to call for 
anything of the kind in the practice of my profession, that it is not almost 
immediately produced, and sometimes under circumstances that surprise me. 

(By Mr. Jewell.) Explain that ? 

A. I mean, that where I am called and want it for medicine, I find that 
they have it near them, and if it is not in the house, it is somewhere close by. 

Q. Is that among the poorer classes ? 

A. Among the poorer classes it is usually found on the spot. 

Q. Among the poorer classes, is it accessible by all of them ? 

A. They all know where to get it. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How is it as to intemperance in families ? 

A. I should say that it was more generally diffused, according to my ob- 
servation, than it was ten years ago. I find other members of families, be- 
sides the father and older sons, who use it. I see it among the female portion 
of families more than I used to. 

Q. How is it as to the children ? 

A. My observation is more limited in that respect, although in repeated 
instances I have found it among children of more mature age. I have met it 
among the children of the schools, who were in the habit of habitual intoxi- 
cation. There is one school that I am connected with, where there are girls 
thirteen or fourteen years of age who frequently come to school under the 
influence of liquor, and frequently have to be sent home. 



APPENDIX. 119 

Q. (By Mr. Mixer.) How do you propose to regulate the sale of 
liquors ? 

A. I am not a legislator, but it has seemed to me that if a license could 
be passed, putting the sale of liquor into the hands of respectable parties, 
placed under bonds, and in sufficient numbers, it would bo an improvement. 

Q. What do you mean by sufficient number ? 

A. Sufficient number for the wants of the community. It has seemed to 
me that the law was so much at variance with public opinion that everybody 
winked at its evasion. 

Q. Are you not speaking unguardedly in speaking of Boston as a unit on 
that subject ? 

A. Well, sir, I speak of it as it seems to me from residence here. It is 
simply an opinion. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Do you mean by sufficient numbers, that a suffi- 
cient number is requisite to the suppression of the clandestine sale ? 

A . So far as that is concerned, it seems to me that if it is placed in the 
hands of respectable parties, it will tend to suppress the clandestine sale. I 
think the history of the prohibitory law shows that we have not had the 
same advantage which we ought to have received. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Did you ever know of a license law wh§re 
unlicensed men did not sell as numerously ? 

A. I cannot answer the question positively. I only answer that I can get 
it more freely in the houses of my patients, than before the prohibitory law, 
and I think that the drinking has increased, and that the clandestine sale has 
increased. 

Q. Has the law been administered in Boston previous to the last two 
years ? 

A. I should say that it had to some extent. 

Q. What extent ? 

A. That I have not the means of knowing. 

Q. Are you not mistaken in supposing that it has really been executed in 
Boston ? Are you aware whether or not a single conviction as a common 
seller, under the prohibitory law, has taken place from 1855 to 1865. 

A. I could not say. I suppose that quite a number of arrests and 
prosecutions have been made. 

Q. You are not aware that a single conviction has been made ? 

A. I have no knowledge on that subject. 

Q. Suppose we had a stringent license law, such as you would favor, how 
would it be as to the children becoming intoxicated ? 

A. It seems to me that by limiting the sale you would limit the oppor- 
tunities for irresponsible parties to obtain alcoholic liquors, and that you 
would be able to take hold of those parties who did sell, if they abused their 
privilege. 

Q. Could you do it until after they had abused their privilege ? 

A. In single instances probably you would not. 

Q. It being accessible to everybody that calls for it, would it be a restraint 
upon the moderate use ? 

A. I think it would. 



120 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You speak of intemperance having increased 
within the last ten years ; do you not attribute some of this increase to the 
influence of the war ? 

A . Undoubtedly some of it has been owing to that cause. I cannot con- 
ceive, however, that the increase should be so much in cases where I have 
seen it in families. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Why do you speak of the people furnishing it 
clandestinely in these cases ? 

A. Because of the way in which it is usually produced in these circum- 
stances, and the apparantly guilty look with which it is produced. 

Q. Betraying a consciousness that it is not a handsome thing to have liquor, 
and that public opinion is against it ? 

A. Yes, sir; that public opinion is against it. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) You say that you voted for the present prohib- 
itory laAV, and that you were then in favor of the principle upon which it was 
founded ? 

A . Yes, sir ; the principle of prohibition. 

Q. Your mind has undergone a change upon that subject ? 

A. It has, sir. 

Q. When did you change your views ? 

A . It has been a gradual change. I should think it had been within the 
last two years. 

Q. If the law could be enforced you would still be in favor of it ? 

A. I can hardly suppose such a state of things. 

Q. I wanted to see whether it was a matter of principle or a matter of 
opinion. In principle are you still in favor of prohibition ? 

A. I am not, wholly, because I think it is a violation of private rights. 

Q. Then you have changed your opinion as to the principle ? 

A. Yes, sir; I have changed it on two grounds. 

Q. I want to ask^ if what are called the influential classes in Boston and 
in the Commonwealth were in favor of the execution of this law, whether 
you think there would be any serious difficulty in enforcing it ; as, for instance : 
take our judges, governors, representatives, senators, physicians, clergymen, 
and such men, if they were in favor of it, would you be in favor of it ? 

A. I cannot conceive of such a state of things. I could not answer. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that you find it has increased where 
you had occasion to order it. Is it not common for physicians to order it for 
many purposes ? 

A. Under various circumstances it is ordered medicinally. 

Q. Is it not common to order it for lung complaints, or for hemorrhage 
from the lungs ? 

A. It is not common to order it for hemorrhage, but it is frequently 
administered for lung complaints. 

Q. Now if I keep it in my house constantly, is that evidence that I 
use it as a beverage ? 

A. I spoke of that matter in contrast with the state of things ten or fif- 
teen years ago. Some years, ago, I was frequently obliged to wait some time 
before a small quantity of ardent spirits could be got from some distance. 



APPENDIX. 121 

Testimony of Rev. Edward T. Taylor. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How long have you been in Boston ? 

A. Oh, not very long ; only about fifty years. 

Q. How long have you been a minister in Boston ? 

A. About forty-five years. Between thirty and forty years settled as I 
am now. 

Q. Where has been the principal field of your administration within that 
last period ? 

A. North Square — about the head of everywhere. 

Q. Have you had anything to do with sailors during that period ? 

A. Yes, sir. From my boyhood I have been linked in with them, and 
expect to be until the time when we will go aloft together. 

Q. What has been your observation as to the progress of intemperance 
during the last ten or fifteen years ? 

A. There has been a very great improvement. 

Q. What caused this improvement among your people ? 

A. An increased ardor and obedience to conscience and the laws of 
God, not for the stronger to leave the weaker to be devoured by the wolves 
that seek those who are not able to defend themselves. 

Q. In regard to the number of places where these wolves are, how has it 
been during the last five years ? 

A. Multitudinous. I should think there was about a breastwork from the 
Square down to Charlestown Bridge. I believe that the rum-houses are 
scarcely out of sight one from the other. We have a plenty of idlers. 
Whether they live on air or steam, I know not. 

Q. What has the influence of that great number of places been upon the 
habit of the people in regard to temperance ? Do they lead astray ? 

A. Yes, sir. Everything that possibly can be done is done. These 
people are followed from the houses to the ship, and when no other vessel can 
be obtained to go aboard, the bewitching matter, they will have it in a 
bladder. 

Q. Has there been any diminution of these places since the prohibitory 
law passed twelve or fifteen years ago ? 

A. Prohibitory law ! I did not know that they had one. 

Q. Have these places for the last twelve or fifteen years been constantly 
increasing or not ? 

A. I think they have not died with age. They remain, and they are 
exceedingly plenty. It is painful to the eye to go down our street — North 
Street — until we get down to North Square, and see both sides barricaded 
with bottles in plenty, and plenty of loafers lying around them that cannot 
get a living honestly, and must take it from somebody else. 

Q. Are you in favor of prohibitory law ? 

A. By no means. I have no right to punish the righteous with the 
wicked, and I ought, I suppose, to give a reason why. I think, sir, that a 
hotel is for something else besides setting a table and making a bed. With 
rapid and hard travelling, getting down to this our unequalled and blessed city, 
travellers are racked and tortured with their long journeying. When they 
get here they arc liable, in our sudden changes, to contract diseases; and I 
1G 



122 APPENDIX. 

believe that no landlord ought to be allowed to keep a bouse merely for 
furnishing beef and potatoes, but he must take care of the health of his 
guests ; and while he has nothing in his house to supply them, and while he is 
sending for a doctor, disease may get beyond recovery. The landlord ought 
to take care of his lodgers, and should be able to take care of them until 
greater wisdom is brought. That is my explanation. I am willing everybody 
should have it. I have never needed such things myself, but every man was 
not made with such a hide as I was, for I have seen noble men faint away. 
It was only four years ago that I was in Canada, where a number of our 
hard-working business men were getting a little recreation, and they were so 
conscientious about temperance that two or three persons lost their lives by 
getting heated from walking and then drinking the lime-water that they have 
there, for lime-water is all through that region. Two or three of these 
abstainers came to me and asked me what to do. I said to them, use a little 
brandy. But they were so conscientious upon that point that they would not. 
They soon passed away. This lime-water is in Cincinnati and a good many 
places, and many a noble young man or woman is taken away from want of 
wisdom on this subject. Therefore I think it would be out of the question to 
forbid the use or the sale of spirit in all cases. This prohibitory law shuts us 
in. Moreover there is something else in this matter. I should not want to 
deny my God. The good book tells us that wine cheereth the heart of God and 
man. I should not want to raise my hand against the hand of God. And I 
should not want to think that the world was so reduced ; and I do not believe 
we are so lost in the world. Yet for my own part I have not had use for 
these things ; but everybody is not so. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you not know that this necessity of which 
you speak is supplied by the present prohibitory law ? 

Q. (By Mr. Taylor.) What ? Have you got a prohibitory law ? 

A. (By Mr. Spooner.) Yes, sir. 

A. Well, then, it must have a good many pockets. These glass jars, set in 
straw, are very easy things to carry, and it is very easy to get them filled. 

Q. Under the prohibitory law, you said that the sale was allowed for nec- 
essary purposes ? 

A. I am opposed to the present law, which opens the door everywhere to 
the most worthless beings to sell liquor ; and, it seems to me, that the more 
worthless the being, the more liberty he has. 

Q. You have lived in Boston fifty years, and have lived here under the 
license system. Do you not know that anybody who pleased sold without 
a license at that time ? 

A. I believe they did. 

Q. How would a license law restrain it, if it was enforced as it was 
before ? 

A. I suppose the effect would be just the same, and just what it ought to 
be, under a consistent license law, with something at the back of that law to 
carry that law out ; not making a law and putting it into the cradle and rock- 
ing it with a lullaby ; but letting it have a power and force and meaning in 
it. 



APPENDIX. 123 

Q. I should like to ask you how a license law is going to be enforced 
against these unlicensed sellers any better than the present law ? 

A. I should think that people would learn by experience on this subject, 
that there is some difference between such a prudent, talented, honest, ener- 
getic man to use that fiery concern, and when it is let out to everybody ; and 
perhaps if a good, clever fellow goes and makes a complaint to-day, he 
may get in a narrow place to-morrow. 

Q. I understand you to say that they do sell it everywhere ? 

A . I never knew that we ever did have a very restricting law ; for it never 
did work much, and I suppose it was never expected to do much. 

Q. Have you known of any attempts to work it in Boston that seemed to 
you intended to make it worse ? 

A. I think I have never seen anything from it worthy of the dignity of a 
law. 

Testimony of Albert G. Goodwin. 

Q. (By Mr Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Worcester Street, in this city. 

Q. With what charitable association are you associated ? 

A. The Boston Provident Association. 

Q. Does that bring you in connection with the poor ? 

A . Yes ; every day and every hour of the day. 

Q. What has been your observation, for the last ten years, as to the pro- 
gress of intemperance here ? 

A. I think it has been steadily on the increase, within my observation. 

Q. How is it with regard to the places where liquor is obtained ? 

A. I think the places where it is procured are now more in attics and 
cellers, and it is sold by the pint and gallon at the retail stores. 

Q. Have you, from your observation, been able to form an opinion as to 
effect of the present law, as compared with the effect properly of a license 
law? 

A. I have thought very much upon the question, and was much rejoiced 
when the present law was passed ; but still the evil increased and increased 
(from my observation,) and I should say, if I were asked here, that we should 
try something else, and that is a stringent license law. 

. Q. Your opinion upon this matter has changed, then, if I understand 
you? 

A. It certainly has. 

Q. And you believe that a license law would be a better system at the 
present time ? 

A. I would like to see it tried. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How long have you lived in Boston ? 

A. About fifteen or eighteen years. 

Q. You did not live here when we were under a license law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Did you ever hear anything of the condition of things while we were 
under a license law ? 



124 APPENDIX. 

A. No. I was constantly at sea at that time, and I knew nothing about 
the laws of the country, hardly. I have taken a great interest (as much as 
any man, I think,) in the cause of temperance of late years, and I am sorry 
to say it seems to have got beyond the power of man almost. Without some 
kind of legislation, I feel that we are like a ship upon the rocks, where the 
master knows not what to do, and he is willing to take the advice almost 
of fools. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How many years have you been an active tem- 
perance man ? 

A. With the exception of two years, twenty-five years. 

Q. Do you mean by temperance, total abstinence or moderate use ? 

A . I mean total abstinence from everything that intoxicates. 

Q. How extensively have gentlemen holding total abstinence views, and 
who favored the existing law, changed their opinions and favored a license 
system, so far as you know ? 

A. I do not suppose a great many of them have. 

Q. Have you been acquainted, during your residence in Boston, with 
many total abstinence men ? 

A. I think I have, more so than I have with the other class. 

Q. So far as you know, they are still in favor of the prohibitory law ? 

A. I should think many of them were, for this reason, that many of them 
feel that it is more for their own protection than for the multitude. 

Q. Do you mean that they are reformed men ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. Have you any acquaintance with men, who are total abstinence men, 
who have not changed ? 

A. Yes, sir; many. 

Q. And do you find them still in favor of sustaining the present law ? 

A. I cannot say that I do. 

Q, Do you find many otherwise ? 

A. Yes; many. 

Q. What fraction ? 

A. I should think, certainly, over half. 

Q. Do you speak of men who are still active in the temperance cause ? 

A. No, sir ; I speak generally of the citizens of Boston with whom I am 
acquainted. 

Q. Did you ever know half of the citizens in Boston to be on the total 
abstinence principle ? 

A. That is putting a question which no man can answer. I said half of 
the men that I knew ; for I certainly do not know half of the citizens of 
Boston. 

Q. Are there total abstainers who have changed their opinions, and still 
are active in any temperance organization ? 

A. Oh, yes. 

Q. What temperance organization do you know, more than half of which 
— excepting, if you please, the Suffolk Temperance Union— are opposed to 
the present law ? 



APPENDIX. 125 

A. I think more than half of them are in favor of the prohibitory law. 
When I said half of my general acquaintance in Boston, I should say that 
over half are not in favor of it. 

Q. But you do not know any temperance organization, more than half 
of which are not in favor of the present law ? 

A. No. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You used to follow the sea ? 

A. I did, thirty years ago. 

Q. How are the habits of the seamen now, compared with your early 
experience ? 

A . As a class they are as different as light from darkness. 

Q. Improved or degenerated ? 

A . Degenerated. 

Q. You have not followed the sea for the last fifeeen years r 

A. No. 

Q. But you did before that ? 

A . I have been in the habit of visiting ships lately, that arrived in the 
harbor, and I have thus been able to compare the habits of sailors. 

Q. Do you mean to say that the habits of seamen, forty years ago, were 
better than now ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. Did not everybody drink then ? 

A. No. For sixteen years, I was master of a ship; and I defy any man 
to say that I ever brought up a bottle to give a sailor. 

Q. What years ? 

A. From 1825 to 1840. 

Q. Do you remember when this reform commenced ? 

A. I was then at sea. 

Q. Were not rations furnished to almost every one by the merchants of 
Boston, forty years ago ? 

A. When I first went out they were. 

Q. How is it now ? 

A. They are not now furnished, I think. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Do sailors drink more ashore now than they used 
to? 

A. I think they do. I do not say they have greater facilities, but they are 
a different class of people. But since we have got our School Ship I hope 
they will go back to the better state of things. 

Testimony of Rev. J. B. O'Hagan. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. At St. Mary's, Endicot Street, in this city. 

Q. Have you the charge of the church ? 

A . I am assistant pastor. 

Q. How long have you been there ? 

A. Eighteen months. 

Q. "Where before ? 



126 APPENDIX. 

A. In the army of the Potomac, with the exception of a year spent at the 
Georgetown College. 

Q. What has been the result of your observation in Boston, as to the effect 
of the present law in promoting temperance ? 

A. I cannot form a comparative judgment. My judgment is that the law 
is a failure. About a week ago last Monday, the State Constables came to 
our part of the city and seized liquors there, all they could find in the various 
places where it was kept. I observed that within five minutes after the con- 
stables had gone, they were concerned in selling in the same shops again. I 
presume they had the liquors secreted. I was passing through Haymarket 
Square in the afternoon, and I heard a gentlemen remark that he saw more 
drunken men that day than for eight months before. 

Q. How is it, as to the places where liquor can be got, whether directly or 
clandestinely ? 

A. I think since this law has been put in force, it has been kept and sold 
furtively, and I think it has added to the intemperance of the community, 
particularly among women, who, in the absence of their husbands, get together 
and get drunk. 

Q. Have you seen any children made intemperate by it ? 

A. No. There is not a great deal of intemperance among the older class, 
but there are some women, and some men, also. Those who attend our 
church regularly are not addicted to intemperance now. But I do not 
consider that so much the effect of the law as of our organization. 

Q. What is your organization ? 

A. I have an organization of about three hundred married persons, and 
nearly all total abstinence men. 

Q. In those efforts which you have exerted have you found success ? 

A. Yes; I found religious influences far more effective than prohibition. 
[ have found that prohibition generally excites opposition on the part of many. 

Q. From your observation have you formed any opinion as to the 
probability or possibility of preventing the sale ? 

A. I do not think it possible, from my present observation. 

Q. Does the present law retard or aid your efforts ? 

A . I think it retards moral efforts, rather than aids them. 

Testimony of Rev. Michael Hartney. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Salem. 

Q. Your calling ? 

A. I am a Catholic clergyman, pastor of the Church of the Immaculate 
Conception. 

Q. How long have you been there ? 

A. Since August, 1857. 

Q. Where, before that? 

A. I commenced my career as a clergyman at that time. 

Q. What has been your observation as to the progress and state of 
intemperance during that period among, not your own flock alone, but 
generally ? 



APPENDIX. 127 

A. Before giving my opinion, I should state, that I do not like to be iden- 
tified with any party at this hearing, either with the liquor party or anti-liquor 
party. I would state that my own people, I consider, to be an orderly, sober, 
temperate people. I do not attribute that, however, to the working of the 
prohibitory law. I attribute it to their attendance to their religious duties as 
Catholics. I believe that, if a Catholic attends to his religious duties, and 
observes the precepts of the church, he will not be a drunkard. That is my 
experience. Of course, there are some persons who drink and get drunk, no 
doubt ; but I say that, as a general thing, my people are orderly and sober. 
With regard to the working of the prohibitory law, it is my opinion that 
it has proved a failure. With regard to my opinion as to a license law, I 
would state that I would approve any law which would best diminish the evils 
of intemperance and liquor-selling. In my opinion, a license law tends to 
diminish the abuse of liquor-selling rather than a prohibitory law, for this 
simple reason, that I think it is in human nature not to care much about what 
it is easy to obtain. If a man finds that he is prohibited from doing a thing, 
it is in corrupt human nature to say he will have it. I think a license law will 
put down many low groggeries, and diminish, to a great extent, the results 
of private and furtive sale of liquors, especially in large cities. 

Q. (By. Mr. Spooner.) You spoke of the temperate habits of your 
people. Do you attribute that, in a great measure, in addition to religious 
influences, to the personal example of the clergy and leading men ? 

A. Yes. That does a great deal towards it. 

Q. The idea has been expressed that moderate drinking is temperance. 
When your clergy speak of temperance, do they mean total abstinence or the 
moderate use ? 

A. I think that temperance, according to the general acceptation, means 
total abstinence ; but, if I were asked what temperance is, I would say it is 
a moderate use of anything eaten or drank. 

Q. Then your idea of temperance is that it is not total abstinence ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. Is that so understood among your clergy ? 

A. Among the people, they say that, if they wish to take a pledge, they 
take the total abstinence pledge. 

Q. Do they consider a man a temperance man, who is in the habit of using 
liquor and does not abuse it ? 

A. They consider him a temperate man, and not a temperance man. I 
think that distinction is made. 

Q. If not improper, I would like to know whether your clergy practise 
total abstinence or a moderate use ? 

A. I cannot say; I do not know what the clergy do. They practise tem- 
perance, so far as I know. 

Q. Did you ever take the temperance pledge ? 

A. Never. 

Testimony of Mayor Otis Norcross. 
Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are one of the petitioners, are you not? 
A. No, sir ; I think not. 



128 APPENDIX. 

Q. You are Mayor of Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Your opinion you recommend in your inaugural address ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state any reasons which you may have for 
your opinion ? 

A. From my general observation while I was connected with the city 
government — 

Q. How long a time was that ? 

A. I was alderman three years, commencing in 1862. Since that I have 
been intimately acquainted with the city government ? i 

Q. State in your own way your observation in reference to this subject ? 

A. Well, sir, my views are, that the present prohibitory law has been 
inoperative, because the public sentiment was not with it. It was not the 
wish of the mass of the people that it should be carried out ? 

Q. I would inquire your opinion as to a properly constructed license law, 
as compared with the present law, and as to the execution of the one or the 
other, and which would best restrain the effects of intoxication ? 

A. I think a license law would be better. I think that experience has 
proved the other to be inoperative. Our city government filled the courts 
with complaints under the law. There was a difficulty in convicting, and the 
time of the courts was so much consumed that the District- Attorney requested 
the Chief of Police not to put any more bases into court. I think, with a 
proper license law, we could enforce it. 

Q. I would be glad to know how confidently you hold your opinion. 
State what kind of a license law you think can be enforced ? 

A. I cannot go into the details. It should generally restrain the sale ; not 
allow it to be sold on Sundays ; not allow it to be sold to minors,' or to per- 
sons known to be in the habit of making improper use of it. Various 
restrictions of that kind, I think, would be desirable. Licenses should be 
given only to persons of reputation and character. My own view of it is 
that the right might be given to each town or city in the Commonwealth to 
adopt the license law or retain the present law. And I would have the 
punishment for violation the same as in the present law. 

Q. In regard to license, would you have any fixed time to continue, or 
make them subject to revocation ? 

A. I think they should be subject to revocation whenever, in the judg- 
ment of the mayor and aldermen, it was thought expedient. 

Q. With such a law in force, what, in your judgment, would be the effect 
as to breaking up the unauthorized places ? 

A. I have no doubt that it could be done. 

Q. That is your opinion very strongly, that you could enforce it ? 

A. That is my opinion. 

Q. What would be the effect of a law, executed in that manner, upon 
intemperate habits and the excessive use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I think it would be a great improvement. I think the difficulties are 
now so great, and these drinking places are so common, that when a man gets 
his pay for his week's work, he is enticed into them, because they are open at 



APPENDIX. 129 

almost every step in the street. I think the effect would be, if we break up 
these places, to drive out of the business a class of persons who sell inferior 
spirits of all kinds. 

Q. What is your view with regard to the public sentiment against the 
execution of this prohibitory law ? 

A. My own experience is that a large majority are opposed to the present 
law. They think it is a failure. To be sure, a few State Constables have 
made arrests and broken up a few places ; but it amounts to nothing. They 
have not taken hold of any persons of consequence. It is only a few unim- 
portant persons. There has been a great noise, but at the same time I do not 
think it has effected much. Drunkenness increases, according to the reports. 

Q. How is it as to the number of arrests for drunkenness, as reported by 
the police, for the last week or ten days V 

A. There have been more at the station-houses. I recollect that on one 
day, within a week, the number was less. As a general rule the number is 
about the same from day to day. 

Q. Has there been no diminution under the operations of the State 
Constables ? 

A. I do not see that there has. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say the operations of the State Constables 
amount to nothing ? 

A. • I do not think they have much effect upon the great question. 

Q. Are you not aware, that according to Mr. Kurtz's report, there are five 
hundred less places where liquors are sold in Boston, than there were before 
the constabulary law went into operation ? 

A . I do not think that is very material. The important question is, how 
many are arrested for drunkenness ? I was not aware of the fact which you 
refer to. I think it is about two hundred less than it was a year ago. 

Q. How many persons would you probably license, supposing the mayor 
and aldermen had it at their discretion ? 

A. That is a very important question, and would require a great deal of 
consideration. I have never considered it. 

Q. Could not you guess ? 

A . That is too important a question to decide by a guess. 

Q. You recommend a license law ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. Do you think you would license three hundred ? 

A. I could not tell, and should prefer not to state, as I have not given the 
matter sufficient consideration. 

Q. You say the law was not enforced, because the courts had more cases 
than they could attend to ? 

A. That was the fact when I was on the board of aldermen, and I think 
it is so now. 

Q. Do you know how many cases they have now ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. Don't you think the present State Constables have found more cases, 
and that they have no trouble in disposing of them ? 

A . I do not know. 
17 



130 APPENDIX. 

Qi (By Mr. Miner.) Are there not twenty-nine hundred cases now 
awaiting sentence in Suffolk County ? 

A. I am not conversant with the statistics. 

Q. You say the trouble was because the courts were so full. I wish to 
show that the facts prove that the constables have furnished more cases than 
the police did, and that there have been many more convictions. 

A. I do not know how that is. 

Q. Supposing that to be true, what do you make of the trouble ? 

A. I only state the fact as it was ; I cannot go into any argument about it. 

Q. There used to be two thousand places where they sold. If you license 
five hundred will that not fill the courts ? 

A. You say that the present law convicts, and we can use the same 
machinery to convict under a license law. 

Q. You gave a statement that it is your opinion that intemperance 
increases, because the number of drunkards is greater now. What is your 
reason for thinking so ? 

A. The Deputy Chief has made a table, from which I can give a few 
figures. According to his estimates in 1856, there were seventeen thousand 
called lodgers ; nine thousand were lodgers, and the rest were put in for 
drunkenness. In 1866 there were twenty-seven thousand, of which ten thou- 
sand and fifty were lodgers, and the rest were arrested for drunkenness. He 
has classified the cases, classing those who were slightly intoxicated as lodgers. 

Q. Have you not the fact in your mind that three years ago there were 
some seventeen thousand and more ? 

A . I have not given my mind to that particularly ; I cannot say. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) I would like to inquire as regards the character of 
the city government now, compared with any previous one ? 

A. I have no doubt it will compare favorably with any former government. 

Q. Has the liquor traffic any peculiar control over the city government ? 

A. I am not aware that it has. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Does your memory run back to the time of the 
license law ? 

A. Not distinctly. 

Q. You don't remember whether the unlicensed were prosecuted by the 
licensed ? 

A. I did not take interest enough in public matters at that time to 
remember. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Would you favor the licensing of any open bar in 
Boston ? 

A. That depends upon circumstances. It is a question which I should 
prefer to consider before giving any definite answer. 

Q. You are so far convinced that you would license hotels ? 

A. I have no doubt that the hotels should be licensed, if kept by 
respectable men. I should not wish to express an opinion beyond that. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Would you regard that as a reputable hotel, what- 
ever be its size, in which twice, within two years, there have been rows, where 
hats were smashed down over the heads of inoffensive persons entering the 
hotel ? 



APPENDIX. 131 

A. That might be answered by asking, if in the House of Representatives 
two men should get into a quarel, and they break down each other's hats, 
whether that should be a respectable building or not. Oftentimes, men in 
very respectable, places get to quarrelling, but it does not follow that the place 
is therefore disgraceful. 

Q. What is the object of getting convictions in the county of Suffolk? 

A. That is a question that I should have to refer you to the law officers to 
answer ; it is a thing that does not come into the view of the Aldermen. After 
the complaint has been made, that is for the law officers to settle. 

Q. Is it possible that, as Mayor of the city, or as an Alderman, you are not 
conversant with the difficulty of executing the prohibitory law in question ? 

A. Certainly, sir; I am conversant with the difficulty. 

Q. And you know where the difficulty rests ? 

A. The difficulty was in getting convictions, but I cannot tell the precise 
point. 

Q. Was there any difficulty in getting the writ served against the 
trafficker ? 

A. I suppose not. 

Q. In getting the attorney to plead the case ? 

A. I suppose not. 

Q. With the ruling of the judge ? 

A, I do not know. 

Q. In getting verdicts of conviction from the jurors ? 

A. I supposed that the difficulty was with the juries. 

Q. Are you aware that the juries do disagree in these cases ? 

A . I am aware that they did ; I am aware that there were technicalities 
by which many did escape ; and I think a large number escaped in that way. 

Q. Are you aware that liquor-sellers were put into the jury lists by the 
the Board of Aldermen confessedly ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Are you aware that members of the Board of Aldermen have testified, 
before different committees of the Legislature, that they did select liquor- 
sellers knowingly, and saying, if you don't wish us to do that, make a law to 
the contrary ? 

A. I think that the statement is a slander upon the Board of Alderman, 
or upon any reputable city government. 

Q. I would ask the question of the Honorable Mayor, whether, as Mayor 
of the city government at any period, or whether as a citizen of Boston at 
any period, during the last fifteen years, he has been aware that liquor-sellers, 
known to be such, were selected by men that knew them to be such, and their 
names put into the list whence the traverse juries were to be drawn ? 

A. I never heard of it nor read of it until heard I of it from you this 
morning. I never was cognizant of the fact. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Are you not perfectly aware that liquor-sellers 
have been frequently, if not constantly, on the juries ? 

A. Very likely. I should not wonder, if in selecting my juries, I got men 
on the list myself, who dealt in liquors. 

Q. You never take pains to exclude them ? 



132 APPENDIX. 

A. No. Why should I? 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) You mean that you do not intend to Include or 
exclude a man for that reason ? 

A. Certainly not. The line has never been drawn. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You admit that they have never been excluded 
for that? 

A . I am not aware that the question ever came up. I never heard the 
question mooted anywhere in the city government, as to whether the city 
government selected those who were liquor-sellers, or those who were not. 

Q. The great difficulty, you know, is that the juries could not agree ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You state that you do not exclude a man because he is a liquor-seller. 
Now, I want to know if a man who has an interest of twenty thousand dollars 
as profits from the sale, is a proper man to sit on a jury ? Is not his interest 
too great ? 

A. If he is an honest man 

Q. Is an honest man the right man to sit on his own case ? 

A. You have got to exclude all men from all juries, if you are going to 
exclude a man who has not got some interest. 

Q. Is not the interest altogether too great ? 

A. That is a sort of thing that you cannot tell where to draw the line 
always, for some men may be influenced by a small consideration, and others 
would not be for a large one. You can never execute any laws, nor any 
government, unless you have honest men. 

Q. Do you get honest men on all juries ? 

A . No, sir ; but I think we ought to try to. 

Q. I would ask whether, in your opinion, a man who has an interest of 
twenty thousand dollars against conviction is a suitable man to try a case ? 

A. I do not say that ; I said that it was important for a man to be an 
honest man in trying some of these cases. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Would you exclude a liquor-seller from the jury, if 
you knew him to be a liquor-seller ? 

A. I do not know that I should ; I do not know any reason why I should. 

Q. Why, then, if the Board of Aldermen at any time have selected liquor- 
sellers, knowing them to be such, do you say that it is a slander ? 

A. Because it is assuming that they could have selected any particular 
class of men. 

Q. Does not the law require that jurors shall be men of good moral 
character, and free from legal exceptions ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is a man who is made a criminal by law, free from legal exceptions ? 

A . That is a very difficult question to answer. There is a law that nobody 
on the Sabbath, shall do anything but acts of mercy or charity ; but what 
person is there who is not guilty of violating it every Sunday of his life ? 
Why should not he be excluded, on that principle ? 

Q. Do you regard that as a fair analogy ? 

A. I do, sir ; he violates the law. 

Q. I understand you that' so far as exceptionableness under the law is 
concerned, a man who picks up chips on Sunday, or does some such act, is 



APPENDIX. 133 

equally exceptionable in the eye of the law, with the man who is engaged in 
a criminal traffic, for which you have arraigned his fellow trafficker: you 
intimate that putting a liquor-seller on the jury, is no more a violation of the 
principle ? 

A. I think there is a great difference in the public estimation. This law 
of which I speak is not carried out, because it is not sustained in the public 
mind. 

Q. Do you mean to say that the public mind does not sanction the analogy 
which you run ? 

A. It does not sanction the carrying out of the Sunday law, nor the liquor 
law. 

Q. Why do you say it is a slander to say that liquor-sellers were selected 
to serve on a jury ? 

A. Because, I think that to select jurors to carry out any particular end 
is wrong. 

Q. Do you say that you would not hesitate to select a liquor-seller, and 
put his name in the jury box ? 

A. I would not. I never asked the question whether a man was a liquor- 
seller or not. 

Q. Would you put a gamester in ? 

A. No. 

Q. Would you put a counterfeiter in ? 

A. No. 

Q. Why exclude them ? 

A. I do not think it necessary to answer. 

Q. Do you regard liquor-sellers as reputable men ? 

A. I do, some of them. 

Q. As a class, do you regard them as reputable men ? 

.4. Perhaps there is a greater portion of disreputable men engaged in 
that business. 

Q. Are you aware of names being put into the jury-box so as to make the 
majority consist of liquor-sellers ? 

A. I answer as before ; I never heard the question raised. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I understand your position to be this : that you 
put on a man whom you consider a suitable one, and that you do not consider 
the fact of his selling liquor as disqualifying him ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You do not understand that we charged you with putting them on 
because they were liquor-sellers ? 

A. No. I understood Mr. Miner to charge that in some former time it 
had been so. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) I wish to ask a question having a bearing on 
this one of the jury. Suppose there were two men complained of for a viola- 
tion of the Sunday law, and their cases were pending at the same court, and 
they were both of them upon juries. The first man's case comes on for trial. 
AVould you think the other man, who is also complained of, and whose case is 
then pending in court, would be a suitable juror to try that case, he having a 
case exactly like it ? 



134 APPENDIX. 

A. I do not think he would be so unprejudiced as If he were not so 
situated. • 

Q. Would you say that the man who stands complained of for a violation 
of the Sunday law would be a suitable juror to try the other citizen charged 
with the same offence ? 

A. I think he would be prejudiced. 

Q. Would you not remove him ? 

A. I think the attorney would challenge him. 

Q. That is, if we had a law authorizing it ? 

A . I think we have a law authorizing it now. 

Testimony of Mayopw George Lewis. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are Mayor of Roxbury ? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q. How long have you been Mayor ? 

A. Four years and two months. 

Q.. How long have you been connected with the city government of 
Roxbury ? 

A. Nine years. 

Q. I would inquire of you your observation as to the fact whether the 
present prohibitory law has been or can be enforced to any good purpose ? 

A. I think it has not been, sir. 

Q. What has been the reason ? 

A. I should think, sir, from the indisposition of our people to have it 
executed. 

Q. That indisposition is great enough to obstruct the execution of 
the law ? 

A. I think there is a general lukewarmness in regard to the general 
execution of the law. 

Q. What is your opinion in regard to the future, judging from the past, as 
to the operation of this law ? 

A. I hardly think that the law in the future will meet the favorable 
consideration of our people, any more than it has in the past. 

Q. Could there be any other system of legislation that could check it ? 

A. I do not know, sir. 

Q. Have you any opinion, comparatively, as between a license law and a 
prohibitory law ? 

A. It has seemed to me, that, so far as our own municipality is concerned, 
the prohibitory law having failed, it would be expedient to try a strict license 
system, and see how that would work. 

Q. Has the present law had any effect in checking the progress of intem- 
perance ? 

A. I think it has not, sir. My own means of experience and knowledge 
in this matter are limited. I have no such report made to me as is made to 
the mayor of Boston, daily or weekly. The only reference that I have is 
either the annual report of the City Marshal, or the records of the Police 
Court. 

Q. What do they show as to the progress of intemperance ? 



APPENDIX. 135 

A. I do not know, sir. 

Q. Is intemperance on the increase ? 

A. I think it is not, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say you think the law, within your expe- 
rience, has not done anything to suppress the traffic ? 

A. I have no acquaintance with that fact. 

Q. Are you acquainted with its operation in the various country towns ? 

A. Not at all, sir. 

Q. Your experience is confined — 

A. To Roxbury alone. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have you noticed the result, either by statistics or 
otherwise, of the action of the State Constables either in the city or county ? 

A. I have not, sir. I have read the report rather carelessly. 

Q. Have you in your connection with the city government been able to 
execute the law, while it was unexecuted in Boston ? 

-4. No, sir; nor anywhere eJse. As I said before, the law is not in favor 
with our people, and therefore it is not desired to have it enforced. 

Q. Do you believe that if the law had been enforced in Boston, you 
could have done nothing in Roxbury ? 

A. Oh, not exactly nothing, sir. 

Q. Do you think it would be desirable to suppress the traffic with such a 
law as we have ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. You would like to see that ? 

A . I would like to see the morals of the community improved. 

Q. You think it would improve the morals of the community if the 
law were enforced ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. You do not fear the furtive influence which we have heard of so many 
times ? 

A. So far as we are concerned, I fear no influence which is in the right 
direction. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Is not the operation of the constabulary law 
popular in. your city ? 

A. We do not think anything of it at all. 

Q. Have you had it out there ? 

A. Yes, sir; there were four or five of them out there last Saturday. 
They searched three or four places, and I see that, according to the news- 
paper account, they succeeded in seizing some seventeen gallons of liquor in 
a low place. 

Q. Do you know anything to the contrary ? 

A. I know nothing of it, except what I saw in the newspapers. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you think it objectionable that they should 
seize liquors from low places ? 

A. I do not like the system any way; I think it is demoralizing. 

Q. What is the harm in seizing the liquors from low places, if they are 
such places as you would not wish ? 



136 APPENDIX. 

A. I am not prepared to argue the case. I have given the subject a 
general consideration. My opinions are crude, and I should not desire to 
argue it. 

Q. And you would not be willing to give any expression on the subject ? 

A. My expressions are so crude, that those who are acquainted with it 
might find me in error. 

Q. Have you, since the statute was in force, made efforts, from time to 
time, to punish common sellers in Norfolk County ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Has there been any difficulty in securing convictions ? 

A. That I can only give you second-hand ; not from my knowledge. 

Q. What is your general impression ? 

A. My impression is, that there has, sir. My City Marshal spoke to me 
a year or two ago about it, and said it was impossible to obtain convictions 
It is a matter with which I have had no connection at all. 

Q. Does the mayor in your city give orders to the police ? 

A. Not to the extent that is done in the city of Boston. He does to a cer- 
tain extent. 

Q. As to the question whether such a law shall be enforced, does it rest 
upon the mayor ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Who is the responsible person in directing your police V 

A. The board of Mayor and Aldermen. 

Q. Have the Mayor and Board of Aldermen ever taken final action on 
that subject ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Never, since the law was enacted ? 

A. No. 

Q. Of course the police have had no orders on that subject ? 

A. No special orders. 

Q. Have the Mayor and Aldermen ever been disappointed in regard to 
the efforts of the police in regard to the law ? 

A. I have never heard any expression in regard to it. 

Q. Then the Mayor and Aldermen have never exactly supposed that the 
police had orders to execute that law ? 

A. They have orders to execute all the laws of the Commonwealth. 

Q. Have you reason to expect that they do execute that law ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Have those laws been enforced by your police as generally as other 
criminal laws ? 

A . I think they have. 

Q. And as successfully for ought you know ? 

A. I am unable to say that relatively. 

Q. Do you know anything to the contrary ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Has the enforcement of the law, during the last two 
or three years in Roxbury, in the seizure of liquors and prosecution of the 



APPENDIX. 137 

open places, had any effect; and, if so, what is the fact as to opportunities for 
getting it in other places ? 

A. I do not know. I do not know that there is an open bar in Roxbury; 
and I do not know but there are a hundred. The police say that they do 
not know of an open bar in Roxbury. But a short time since, my City 
Marshal told me that he thought there was more hidden ; and that they got it 
by going into back rooms of houses ; and that the people stayed there and 
drank longer than they would otherwise. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You don't know whether there is an open bar? 

A. I do not. 

Q. You are aware that in the city of Roxbury this great evil exists, and 
you take so little interest in it ? 

A. I deny the last position, that I take very little interest in it. But my 
police are the parties in this matter ; and if they do not do their duty, they 
have to account for it. As I said in the first place, they have been instructed 
to enforce it. By repeated failures, I think the matter has grown, not into 
disfavor, but they feel that they cannot succeed. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) But on information you say that there is no open 
bar in Roxbury ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long has that state of things existed ? 

A. I cannot say, sir. 

Q. Has it arisen from the action of your police, or from the State Con- 
stables ? 

A. I think through both causes. I think our police did much in that direc- 
tion before the State Constables took hold of it. 

Q. Did you ever have such a state of things before, within your 
knowledge ? 

A. I cannot say, sir. I should not wish to answer a question that I do not 
know. 

Q. Have you any reason to think that there was such a state of things in 
Roxbury before ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When ? 

A . I cannot say. Many years ago, when there was a vigorous prosecution 
of liquor-sellers. My impression is to that efFeet. 

Q. But you do not now affirm it ? 

A. No ; I would not affirm much of anything that I have said. Our city 
is very quiet. We have few arrests for drunkenness. Our custom is, if a 
man is able to walk, to send him home. It is only when they are in the habit 
of getting intemperate and being in the street that we arrest them. We gen- 
erally try to get them home and out of the way. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You think that the police and State Constables 
have operated to suppress the open sale ? 

A. I think so. 

18 



138 APPENDIX. 

Testimony op Hon. Charles Theodore Russell. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Cambridge. 

Q. Have you been at any time connected with the city government ? 

A. I was mayor in a part of the year 1861, and the whole of the 
year 1862. 

Q. Has your attention in your official relations been called to this prohib- 
itory law, its execution, and its influence ? 

Q. Yes, sir ; in connection with the execution of the other general laws of 
the Commonwealth and ordinances of the city. I ought to say, perhaps, that 
it was less called to it than it would have been when we were less actively 
engaged in war matters. For a large portion of the time we were engaged 
in recruiting, while I was mayor, and we gave less attention to it than we 
otherwise should. 

Q. What opinion have you formed in regard to the law ? 

A . My impressions are general. My impression at that time was that it 
was a very difficult law to enforce. And you will allow me to state what I 
mean by enforcing. I do not mean merely the complaint against an individual 
and the conviction of that individual before a jury, or of several individuals ; 
but the enforcement of the law in its great purpose of restraining the sale of 
intoxicating drinks as a beverage. I am not very familiar with the operation 
of the law specifically, as to conviction, or the disposition of juries to con- 
vict. But as we speak of the general enforcement of law ; that is, in accom- 
plishing its end, it seems to me that we have not accomplished by it all that 
its friends hoped, and all that its friends thought desirable. 

Q. What is your opinion as to whether it can be enforced, so as to accom- 
plish any great or perceptible diminution of the sale and wrongful use of 
intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I should doubt whether it could, taking enforcement to be what I state 
it to be. I do not doubt but that you may get complaints and convictions, 
but I mean convictions such that the people will consider them as they do 
convictions for other crimes and misdemeanors. I would state, however, that 
I have had no experience in the administration of the city government under 
the present system in the Commonwealth of the State Constabulary. 

Q. What has been your observation as to the effect of the convictions as 
remedying the evil ? 

A . I should think they had not, hitherto. 

Q. Have you any opinion as to the relative efficiency, in the end, to which 
allusion has been made, as to this prohibitory system and any other system ? 

A. I have a general idea that a system of regulation could be better 
enforced than a system of prohibition. If you will allow me to state what I 
mean by a system of regulation, my impression would be this : to leave the 
prohibitory law substantially or entirely as it is now, but engraft on that a 
provision giving the power to the mayor and aldermen of cities, the select- 
men of towns, or the county commissioners, (or whatever authority the legis- 
lature might see fit to designate,) to grant licenses within certain specific 
rules. I would not have open bars anywhere. I speak of licensing the retail 
trade to a certain extent, to be judged of by a proper tribunal, and of 



APPENDIX. 139 

licensing hotels to give to people within their houses ; and I would leave the 
liquor law in its efficiency just as it is now, with all the examples and 
decisions accumulated upon it, so as not to have to settle them again. I 
would leave that to its efficiency ; and my idea is that greater ease in the 
enforcement would grow out of this ; and I think that you would then sepa- 
rate from the illicit traffic a considerable portion of the traffic which the 
majority of the people do not consider as wrong. They consider that the sell- 
ing of a glass of liquor is not a crime. That feeling in the community would 
be met by a license law. Then, in regard to low places, and places of dissi- 
pation and vice, there would be a general consent. There would be, perhaps, 
this thing to be considered on the other side, and that is whether these low 
places would not be enlisted against the then existing system. I think, prob- 
ably, they would to some extent. But I think that there would be a compro- 
mise between the different parts of the community, and that they would sus- 
tain the law, with the convictions of the great community behind them. 

Q. Uniting the two systems would be an improvement, in your opinion, on 
anything we have had ? 

A. That would be my impression. I have not debated it as I should if I 
were a legislator or going to act officially upon the matter. 

Q. Have you a town agent under the present law ? 

A. I think one was appointed under my administration, but I am not cer- 
tain that the party accepted. I am not quite certain whether they have one 
now. I think the agency, practically, amounted to very little, if there was 
one. My idea, compressed in few words, would be, an extension of the 
license system under, the present law. I understand that the present laws 
license for some purposes. I would extend that license. 

Q. For the ordinary purposes for which liquors are bought, where do they 
supply themselves in Cambridge ? 

A. I should think it was more largely, perhaps, from the city of Boston 
than elsewhere. But there are, I am afraid, too many places in Cambridge 
where they can supply themselves if they desire. 

Q. (By Mr. Spoonee.) Have you any opinion as to the number of places 
it would be expedient to license in the city of Boston ? 

A . No, sir ; I have not knowledge sufficient to determine as to that. It 
would be a question of great responsibility, and some difficulty. 

Q. Would you have an open bar anywhere ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. I judged from your answers that the number of places would be very 
limited, according to your idea ? 

A . My impression is that, in making prosecutions, (I do not speak of the 
State Constables,) the officers pass over the great houses and come down upon 
the smaller ones. If that is the fact, I would take that practical judgment 
and make it law. 

Q. Then you would leave the Tremont House, and the Parker House, and 
the Revere House to sell ? 

A. Yes; to sell within their own limits. I would not allow the Parker 
House to keep an open bar any more than anybody else. 



140 APPENDIX. 

Q. When the constabulary force has four times as much to do as it can 
do, would it not he the proper course to touch where they can do the most 
good? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is that a sufficient excuse for commencing there ? 

A. Yes, sir; it does not require any excuse, in my mind. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I would like to ask if the convictions obtained in 
Middlesex County do not suppress the traffic, why you would rely on 
convictions under a license law ? 

A. There would be, to some extent, the same difficulty. I intended to 
separate the respectable trade from the disreputable trade, and I would 
bring the whole force of the temperance community, and the whole force of 
the respectable trade, to bear against that which is disreputable. To that 
extent I think we should gain, not so much in the conviction, as from the 
general effect. 

Q. Do you think that, if you restrict the sale from ninety-nine men in a 
hundred, you have not the right to restrict the hundredth ? 

A. I should put that precisely on the same ground that we do in electing 
a town clerk. One man has a right as much as another, but the necessity of 
the case only requires one man for the office. 

Q. Would you allow one man to sell to all classes through the town ? 

A . No, sir. I would have the license revokable at the pleasure of the 
granting body. I do not know that I would set a very high price upon a 
license : I would have it revokable on the instant when a man is found selling 
to minors, drunkards, or others to whom he was not authorized to sell. 

Q. Would you allow him to sell freely to everybody ? 

A . No, sir. I would not interfere to protect a man so long as he could 
protect himself. I would rely more upon internal than external influences, to 
restrain men. 

Q. Then you would not rely upon the restrictive power of any law to 
suppress drunkenness ? 

A. No. 

Q. Then why speak of a stringent license law ? 

A. I mean stringency in respect to the general provisions ; such as that it 
should not be sold to a man who has become a drunkard. 

Q. Then this license law is a law for carrying on moderate drinking till 
drunkenness is reached ? 

A . That is not my interpretation of it. I think the moderate drinking 
will go on, and I should rather try to regulate and control it, than to undertake 
to prohibit it and have it out of my control. 

Q. Do you consider the moderate use of liquors to be a good to any class 
of persons ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Why would you not allow minors to drink ? 

A. Because they are less able to protect themselves. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are aware that the moral convictions of 
what are termed the temperance people, are against licensing, and that they 
believe it to be morally wrong to license ? 



APPENDIX. 141 

A . Yes, sir ; I know that is so. 

Q. Supposing you license a few in Boston, would you not necessarily array 
the convictions of the temperance people against that, and also all those who 
do not get a license ? 

A. I should not expect to array the convictions of the temperance men 
against it. I should suppose they would try to make it as effective as possible. 
I should expect some opposition from those who did not get licenses. 

Q. Would not that be very much ? 

A . It would depend upon the demand there was for the liquor. The argu- 
ment would be met by this proposition : We do not license you to sell rum, 
because we do not wish to license but five places (if that is the number) ; you 
may be just as proper a person as any, but we must have but five, and we 
must select as we do in all the other offices. That is the answer to the 
monopoly part of the argument. But as to the moral part of it, so far as 
licensing an evil is concerned, it does not strike me, as a necessary deduction 
that they would resist the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You would not license the sale at all, as a bever- 
age, with reference to the public good ? You concede it all to be evil, but 
hope to restrain the evil more in that way than by the present law ? 

A. I do not know that I should put it in precisely that form. 

Q. But we have had much testimony that the moderate use is good, and 
that it is a trespass upon one's rights to prohibit it ? 

A. That feeling, which I think is honest with a great many persons, is 
one that I should respect, in the proposal that I make for a license law ; and it 
is with the hope of bringing that class of people and the temperance people 
together, that I should look forward to an increased effect of the law. 

Q. But you do not think it is necessary to use it ? 

A. No. I think generally it would be better if people would abstain 
entirely. 

Adjourned* 



142 APPENDIX. 



SIXTH DAY. 

Thursday, February 28th, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M. The testimony in behalf of the 
petitioners, was resumed. 

Testimony of Hon. George C. PacHARDSON. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Boston. 

Q. Where is your place of business ? 

A. Devonshire Street ; I am a commission merchant. 

Q. You are the head of the firm of Geo. C Richardson & Co. ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Were you at any time connected with the municipal government of 
the city of Cambridge ? 

A. In 1863, 1 was Mayor of Cambridge. 

Q. Be good enough to inform the Committee of the result of your owu 
observation, officially and otherwise, as to the practicability of restraining 
intemperance through the instrumentality of the present prohibitory law ? 

A. To be understood fully, I should have to refer to my early experience. 

Q. Explain in your own way. 

A. I have been a resident of Boston, and a business man, for about thirty 
years past. Before I came to Boston (being educated in the north part of 
Worcester County,) we organized temperance movements, and felt that we 
were in a way really, in the end, to stop the sale, or ? in other words, the use 
of ardent spirits. So far as my own observation went, of some five years, in 
the early excitement and controversy upon the temperance question, we 
appeared to be rather successful ; but in the latter part of the time, what we 
call rum stoics began to spring up about us, and the effect was very unfavor- 
able to the cause of what we term true temperance habits of life. « About 
that time I came to Boston, and have been engaged in business here from 
that time to this, but have always taken an interest in the temperance move- 
ments, and although from the time that I have been a resident of Boston I 
have not actively participated with what are termed temperance men, I have 
always felt myself as good a friend of the cause as any other man, and have 
always contributed, whenever I could do so, to aid its work. My own obser- 
vation comes to this point : that prohibition is absolutely impossible, taking 
men and things as they are ; that there is no way of reaching the question so 
effectually and favorably as by a good and what is termed a stringent 
license law. My experience as Mayor of Cambridge confirmed the con- 
victions that had been growing upon me for years in that -.direction. In 
the course of my official duties, finding it impossible, by the reports of the 
police, and the Chief of Police in particular, to restrain, to any very great 
extent, the sale of spirits by unlicensed men in the city of Cambridge, we 



APPENDIX. 143 

had a general meeting upon the question. Some of the leading temperance 
men were with us, and we meant to suppress its sale, if possible. We obtained 
all the evidence we were capable of getting, and it all went to one point. The 
testimony of the police was all on one side — that they could not do it ; that 
in the cases they brought \>efore the Police Court, it was next to impossible to 
convict ; and if they did convict in Cambridge, they were never successful at 
Lowell. That was almost the universal experience in hundreds of cases. 
The county charges were very heavy without much result, and with very little 
effect favorable to the cause. That was the general result. My observation, 
generally, tends to this point : that all efforts heretofore made have proved 
unavailing ; and I think the great difficulty commenced in the enactment of 
the fifteen-gallon law. It caused organized associations to be formed in the 
communities, and liquor was carried in and divided, and paid for by the 
clubs or associations, or whatever you may call them, and in that way, instead 
of a decrease there was a very great increase. The police of Cambridge 
reported to me that there were nearly two hundred families in Cambridge that 
supplied themselves with liquor in that way. They generally came into Bos- 
ton on Saturdays and filled up their jugs or kegs, and divided, and drank it 
on Sundays. That was the usual practice of a large class, and I believe the 
citizens of Cambridge will rank with the citizens of any other city or town 
in the Commonwealth, and the statistics will show that. These practical 
points having come under my observation, I have come to the conclusion that 
you can reach the question in no way except by a stringent license law to 
restrain it effectually. All other restraint is only apparent and nominal, and 
the increase in many directions has been very great. 

Q. Would you have your law so framed as that towns, if they pleased not 
to have it, should have the powerto exclude it or to license it, if they saw fit ? 

A. I should think that would be advisable. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What was the obstacle to the enforcement of 
the law ? 

A . The want of ability to convict. 

Q. Didn't juries agree when the facts were proved ? 

A. The difficulty was to prove the facts before you reached the jury. 

Q. Was it not perfectly practicable for your police to give evidence to 
convict of the violation of the law ? 

A . It might have been possible, but was not practicable. 

Q. What evidence was used? Did the police testify, or did they rely, 
upon the customers ? 

A. Both. They sought, in various directions and in various ways, to 
obtain conviction, but the discipline or organization of the parties in interest 
was so very thorough that it was almost impossible to reach it. 

Q. How many did you suppose sold in Cambridge ? 

A. I have not referred to my statistics. I am merely speaking from 
memory. My impression is that the police reported that there were over two 
hundred places where liquor could be had. I may be wrong in the figures. 
I cannot be positive. 

Q. How many would you license in the town of Cambridge ? 



144 APPENDIX. 

A. I was a resident of Cambridge over twenty-five years. When my 
residence commenced in Cambridge the population was about five thousand. 
Then there were quite a number of licensed taverns and hotels. 

Q. What year was that ? 

A . It was in the early part of 1838 or the latter part of the autumn of 1837, 
about the time that the active legislation commenced in this Commonwealth. 
At that time there were quite a number of taverns and hotels, and, I think, as 
far as tested by these taverns and hotels, in proportion to the population, 
there was nothing like the quantity of ardent spirits consumed in the town of 
Cambridge that there is at the present time. 

Q. That was under the " fifteen-gallon law ? " i 

A . About the time of that law. 

Q. Still, how many would you license in Cambridge ? 

A. The population is about thirty thousand. Cambridge is divided into 
four or five sections. I should think there should be a party licensed in each 
section of the town. I would do nothing that should increase the sale of 
ardent spirits. My action would be to diminish it. 

Q. I should like the numbers as near as you feel prepared to give them. 
You mean to say one in each of the three sections ? 

A. Cambridge is divided into four or five sections; about five it would 
require in Cambridge. I speak without going into an analysis fully, of course. 

Q. Would you license them to sell on the premises to be drank on the 
premises ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would you license wholesalers ? 

A. Not to sell at the bar. I would allow it to be used in the house as 
families use it in their houses. 

Q. Would you license grocers to sell to families ? 

A. A limited number of grocers would probably require to be licensed. 

Q. The number you give is what is now licensed by the present law. You 
would license hotels to sell to their guests, to be drank at the table and in their 
rooms ? 

A. I would, most certainly. 

Q. You would license grocers to sell to respectable individuals ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How many grocers do you think there are in Cambridge ? 
.A. I could not tell. 

Q. Some thirty or forty ? 

A. You can judge just as well as I can in regard to that. 

Q. Do you understand any reason why one respectable grocer should have 
the monopoly of the business ? 

A. I understand it is the duty of all laws to be administered for the good 
of the community, and it is perfectly proper and consistent that those who are 
intrusted with their charge should decide that point. 

Q. Of course they will decide ; but in your judgment would it be just and 
fair to license one grocer where there are forty, and give him a- monopoly of 
the business ? 

A. If the public good required it. 



APPENDIX. 145 

Q. Would the public good require it ? Would it be just ? The question 
of justice comes in. 

A. Entirely so, in my judgment. 

Q. I suppose, of course, that the way you expect to get any benefit from 
a license law, is to suppress the sale by the unlicensed ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You say there are about two hundred in Cambridge that sell, and you 
found it impossible to get convictions, or very difficult, so that you could not 
succeed in your object. If you license five out of the two hundred and 
attempt to suppress the sale by the other one hundred and ninety-five, will 
you not meet the same obstacle ? 

A. No, sir. You create a moral sentiment that will aid you, and the par- 
ties licensed become effective means of aid, and all the influence growing out 
of the license system would be an aid ; instead of operating against you they 
would assist you. I believe the public sentiment is in favor of regulation 
instead of prohibition. 

Q. When you speak of public sentiment, do you mean to say the majority 
of the people ? I suppose the preponderance of opinion in a community is 
the public sentiment ? 

A. I believe the preponderance of the mind of the community that acts 
upon the question, is in favor of a regulating license law. 

Q. " The mind that acts upon the question." Is that the people who have 
thought little of temperance, or those who have felt a great interest in the 
cause, and have been very active in it ? 

A. The mind that acts upon it in the end always prevails upon public 
questions. Sometimes it takes ten years — sometimes twenty years. 

Q. We have had this prohibitory law twenty years ; it has been a matter 
in politics for some time ; efforts have constantly been made to repeal it, but 
have not succeeded in that yet, and here comes a legislature with a majority 
against it. Is not that evidence that the public sentiment of this State is in 
favor of the law ? 

A. Judging from the facts as they appear to me from day to day, I should 
think that there is a very strong desire in the community to suppress the sale 
of ardent spirits. It is almost universal : but an effort has been made for 
fifteen years, and even more than that, more than twenty years, and the com- 
munity are coming to a realizing sense of the fact that they have not stopped 
the sale of it, and they believe it is impossible to do it. 

Q. You give that as your judgment. Is not that particularly the sentiment 
of those with whom you come most in contact — the business men of Boston ? 
Do you know how it is in the country ? 

A . My impression is that the country is now strongly impressed with the 
importance of the suppression of the sale of ardent spirits. They have not 
reached the question yet, how they shall do it. The country can do it much 
more effectually than the city. Their means of obtaining information, and 
of obtaining conviction under the law, are altogether more favorable than in 
the cities on the sea-coast. 

Q. What is the town in Worcester County in which you lived ? 

A. Royalston. 

19 



146 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you been in the habit of going to Eoyalston frequently ? 

A. Not very often. I was there a year ago. 

Q. Have you talked with the people there on tins subject ? 

A. Not particularly. 

Q. Do you know whether the sale is restricted to any great extent in 
Royalston under the law ? 

A. The action of the law now, I am not familiar with, but I know the 
stopping of the sale in what was called the regular stores, the old regular 
traders in the town, worked very unfavorably for many years. It caused 
other stores to come into operation which sold ardent spirits, and it was very 
unfavorable to the temperance cause for many years. How it is at the 
present time I am unable to say. 

Q. Do you know the sentiment of the people who have lived there and 
observed it— whether in favor of prohibition or license ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. Don't you think when you have licensed five, the sense of injustice 
will be very strong upon the one hundred and ninety-five who are not licensed, 
but who have heretofore sold ? Would they not regard it as a monopoly, 
and as very unjust, if it is to be sold at all ; that is, for the purposes you name, 
in the hotels and stores for families ? 

A. The tendency would be that way. 

Q. Would it not be an obstacle and a large one ? 

A. Nothing in comparison with the difficulties we labor under at the 
present time. 

Q. You think it would be much easier to suppress the one hundred and 
ninety-five than the two hundred ? 

A. I think it would. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Would you suppress by a license law, or any law, 
the traffic in liquors to be used as beverages if you could, independent of the 
purposes you have named ? 

A. I would suppress the improper and excessive use of it. 

Q. But would you not deem what is called the moderate use of alcoholic 
liquors as a beverage improper ? 

A . I would not do anything that would not allow every family in the 
Commonwealth to use it in their own family, but I would create a moral 
sentiment that would make them feel responsible for its right use. 

Q. Would a law sanctioning its sale as a beverage create a moral senti- 
ment against its use as a beverage ? 

A. In connection with the work which true temperance men would do, it 
would. 

Q. You think it would do it ? 

A. I think a license law would be an aid. 

Q. Just tell me how you as an advocate of abstinence would feel aided 
by a law that declared that the public good demanded the sale of ardent 
spirits ? 

A. I believe it is demoralizing to a community to the greatest extent for 
the legislature to enact laws that the public know cannot be enforced, and 



APPENDIX. 147 

that they do not put themselves in a position as citizens of the Commonwealth 
to enforce. 

Q. You are begging the question, inasmuch as we have the testimony of 
an expert that the present law can be enforced as his experience. If the 
object is to suppress the use as a beverage, whether you would feel yourself 
aided as a true temperance man in suppressing the use of alcoholic liquors 
as beverages, by a law which provided for their sale as demanded by the public 
good? 

A . I have answered that. 

Q. How ? 

^4. I told you I thought the law would aid you. 

Q. How would a law, declaring its use to be a public good, aid you in sup- 
pressing its use ? 

A. If the law regarded it to be a public good that men should use it, if 
they chose to use it in their private families or at public houses of enter- 
tainment 

Q. It would aid you in convincing the public that it is their duty to 
abstain from its use ? 

A. I don't think it would be any injury. 

Q. Do you ask for a license law in the interest of total abstinence ? 

A. I do not believe in total abstinence. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) In Utah, polygamy is practised, and is prevalent 
there. Recently they have petitioned Congress to repeal their laws against 
polygamy, because they are not enforced and cannot be enforced, and are 
opposed to public opinion. I would like your judgment whether that would be 
expedient because they chose to practise polygamy and have not yet been 
able to suppress it ? 

A. I will appeal to the Chairman whether that question is connected with 
the temperance question in Massachusetts. Not having been a resident of 
Utah, I am not capable of answering the question. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Would you, as a general rule of legislation, 
repeal all laws which could not be universally, absolutely enforced ? 
"Would you, as a general rule, if you find a law cannot be enforced, repeal it 
for that reason ? 

A . I should not say I would repeal all laws that could not be absolutely 
enforced. I do not believe in absolutism. We must approach as near per- 
fection as we can. 

Q. Strike out the word " absolute ? " 

A. I would repeal a law when it had been proved that it was not bene- 
ficial to the community. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You would repeal all laws in every democratic 
community, which the public opinion does not sustain ? 

A. The question involves all legislation connected with government affairs. 
It is most too broad for me. I should always approximate as near that as the 
public good in my judgment would allow, taking all the circumstances of the 
case from time to time into consideration. 



148 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You lived in the country in early life, during the 
existence of license laws. Do you recollect whether the license law ever did 
anything to suppress the traffic ? 

A. In my judgment, in my native town, it was the most effective means of 
suppressing intemperance. 

Q. What years ? 

A. Previous to 1835. 

Q. Was intemperance suppressed by the law ? Was not that the result of a 
moral sentiment ? 

A. The store I was educated in sold ardent spirits; the store opposite, 
also. No men stood higher in Worcester County than the gentlemen at the 
head of the two establishments. In 1831 or '32 we stopped the sale entirely. 
Upon the premises in which I was educated, there was never anything like 
intoxication. No man presumed to buy ardent spirits expecting to use it im- 
properly. When we left off selling it, other stores in the community rose up, 
and were known to be rum stores, and manufactured drunkards ; — that, I 
know. 

Q. Were those stores that sold in that way licensed ? 

A. They were licensed at that time. 

Q. Then how did your license law restrain the traffic ? 

A. The establishments that were in existence before this were sufficient to 
accommodate the community, and that was a question brought up distinctly 
at a public meeting upon the question, and they said it was an interference 
with the rights of the people. It was said we were dictating to the people 
that they should not use spirit, and the farmers became stockholders in the 
store. 

Q. The store you said you were in, and another one opposite, gave up the 
business. Why ? 

A . Because we felt a very strong interest in stopping the sale entirely, if 
possible. We felt we could stop the sale, and were defeated. 

Q. You gave up from moral considerations, and then under the license 
law they went and licensed worse men and manufactured drunkards. I don't 
see how that makes it out that the license restrained the traffic. 

A. The proper use of the license. 

Q. Licensed people gave it up, and then they went and licensed disreput- 
able people ? 

A. There is a proper administration of law, and an improper one. 

Q. In this case they licensed improper persons under the license law, and 
drunkards were made ? 

A. I am not prepared to say that. They licensed persons who sold — and 
we refused to sell. 

Q. The license law did not cause you to give it up ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. But caused others less respectable to sell it, and the consequences were 
bad. You gave it up from moral considerations, and worse people took up 
the traffic. I don't see how that makes it out that the license law suppressed 
the traffic ? Have you changed your views on the subject ? 



APPENDIX. 149 

A. At that time the same rules would not work that would work at the 
present day, after thirty years' experience under the legislation of the 
Commonwealth. 

Q. I understand you to refer to that period in favor of a license law ? 

A . In regard to the practical element. 

Q. You speak of the fifteen-gallon law. How long was that in operation ? 

A. My impression is, two or three years. 

Q. It was in operation eight months only, I believe ? 

A. Only a short time. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) Were there others who sold at that period 
besides those who were licensed ? 

A. I could not answer that. 

Q. Do you remember whether persons who had licenses were in the habit 
of looking out that no others sold ? 

A. The licenses were merely nominal: only a small compensation being 
required ; not as they would be to-day. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Just how would you make a license law stringent ? 

A. I can only answer that question by saying that, so far as I was 
capable, I would construct one that could be enforced. 

Q. You only say the same thing over, in other words. The practical 
point is, how can you make a license law, the very point and drift of which 
is to protect men in selling liquor ; how can you make that stringent, so as to 
prevent men from becoming intoxicated under the operation of that law ? 

A. I do not suppose it could be made so as to do that. 

Q. You yield that point ? 

A. I do not suppose it is possible to do that. 

Testimony of Ex-Mayor Frederic W. Lincoln, Jr. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How long have you been connected with the 
government of Boston ? 

A. My first term of service was in 1858-59-60. My second term was in 
1863-4-5-6. 

Q. Be good enough to give your impression, as it came under your 
official notice, and official information from your subordinates, of the working 
of the present law in regard to checking the excessive use of intoxicating 
liquors ? 

A. My impression and my conviction is that the present prohibitory law> 
so called, cannot be enforced, although efforts were made by me and by my 
subordinate officers in that direction. 

Q. Have you any information as to the excessive use of liquor ? Take 
the period of your being in office, or the last ten or fifteen years ? 

Q. My impression is, that it has increased ; that the sale of ardent spirits 
and the number of drunkards have increased faster than our population has 
increased. 

Q. You have your regular reports of the number of drunkards taken in a 
state of intoxication. Hoav great a proportion, in your judgment, of those 
who really drink to excess are borne on those reports ? Do all intoxicated 
persons come under the notice of the police ? 



150 APPENDIX. 

A. I suppose those are correct. 

Q. The reports are correct, but do the police see and know every man 
that gets drunk in Boston, and report it ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How great would be the proportion of those who drink to excess and 
are occasionally drunk or habitually not reported by the p # olice ? Have you 
any information as to how large the proportion would be ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. As to the places of sale, public and secret, and the increase of them 
during this last term ? 

A. I should think they had increased. That is a fact which could be 
testified to by the Chief of Police better than by me. 

Q. From your own observation and experience, your opinion of the 
efficacy in the same direction of checking intoxication by a proper license 
law? 

A. The whole subject is surrounded with difficulties. My conviction is 
that under all the circumstances in this community that a license law would 
be most effectual. , 

Q. As to the efforts of the city government under your administration to 
enforce the law. Did you make efforts ? 

A. Yes, sir. We were continually making efforts. There was no term 
in the court, but more or less cases were put before the grand jury. 

Q. Did the city government continue that until they were asked by the 
authorities of the courts to desist ? 

A. They have always continued. I recollect in two or three instances 
the district-attorney came in to me and says, " Why are you putting so many 
of these liquor cases before the court ? It is a great expense to the country. 
We can't try them." I told him I could not help that. It was .our duty to 
make the complaints. When it goes into the courts it is for the grand jury, 
district-attorneys and juries to convict. We have nothing to do with that. 
We must do our duty in the matter. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What efforts were made under your administra- 
tion to suppress the sale ? 

A. By complaining of the persons who sold. 

Q. To what extent did they complain ? 

Q. (By Mr. Lincoln.) You mean the exact number ? 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Generally, as near as you recollect. How 
many cases were brought as near as you recollect ? They have been reported 
from year to year ? 

A. Those reports will state exactly how many cases were reported. For 
instance, the last report of the police happened to be here yesterday, and 
looking it over I found last year forty-one common sellers. 

Q. Forty-one cases reported ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You think that was much of an effort to suppress it ? 

A. Yes, sir. The difficulty was in this way. We would lay a certain 
number of cases before the grand jury and then they were carried into court, 
and if the district-attorney should ascertain that the jury would convict, more 



APPENDIX. 151 

cases would be put in ; but generally a number were put upon file and the 
district-attorney would not find the jury would convict, and therefore no 
efforts were made in that term of the court to get other convictions. 

Q. One great trouble was the failure of juries to convict. That applied 
to common sellers particularly ? 

A. Also under the Nuisance Act. 

Q. Have you known cases where they would not convict under tho 
Nuisance Act where the case was clearly proved ? 

A. I am not so clearly acquainted with the details as I never went into 
court. My impression is that the reason the grand jury after a case was laid 
before them would find a bill of indictment under the Nuisance Act was 
because there was more probability of a conviction under that Act than 
otherwise. 

Q. Did you not understand there was no particular difficulty in convicting 
under the Nuisance Act ? 

A. I don't think there was as much difficulty. 

Q. The reports show that during the last three years in a city where there 
were about two thousand sellers, the police made in 1864 two hundred and 
ninety-nine complaints. Should you suppose that the presentation of two 
hundred and ninety-nine cases under the Nuisance Act, in a year where the 
fine was $50, was anything that could be called an effort to suppress the traffic ? 

A. Yes, sir ; because, if there could have been convictions, more would 
have been presented. 

Q. Are you not aware that the State Constables have procured the con- 
viction of something between two and three thousand men in two years ? 

A . I have seen that statement in the paper. 

Q. Do you doubt it ? , 

A. I have no reason to doubt it. 

Q. They had about thirty men, and the police had three or four hundred ? 

A. They were specially detailed for that duty. 

Q. Could not the police of Boston be specially detailed for that duty ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you not regard it of consequence enough to suppress the traffic ? 

A. General orders were given to the police to do what they could under 
this law as under any other law. I think a large portion of the police were 
desirous of executing the law. I believe two-thirds or three-fourths of them 
are temperance men, pledged men. 

Q. Then the police obeyed the orders of their superiors ? 

A. Yes, sir. If they could make out, as they say, a case, they would put 
it in. 

Q. In your judgment, why could they not make out cases as well as the 
State Police ? 

A. I don't know as I could answer that. I don't know exactly what the 
State Police did. 

Q. You say your police could not suppress the traffic or enforce the law. 
These convictions were obtained under the State Police. I want to know 
why the City Police could not obtain these convictions as well as the State 
Police ? 



152 APPENDIX. 

A. Possibly, one of the reasons why the State succeeded so well in this 
matter, was from the very fact that indictments had been taken against these 
very parties, and this additional force upon the parties was put on by the 
State after some complaints had been made by the City Police. 

Q. The report of your police says they had only arrested two hundred and 
ninety-nine persons in one year ; for that purpose this number of arrests was 
small? 

A. I am not acquainted with the detail of that report; if the chief was 
present he could explain that, or some other officers of the department. 

Q. I would like to ask whether you understand that the Sunday law has 
been pretty generally enforced lately ? 

A . Not more generally than it has been some two or three times during 
my administration. 

Q. When was it enforced during your administration ? 

A. Some two or three years since; I do not know exactly; eighteen 
months or two years since. 

Q. How long did that continue ? 

A. Until we had some trouble by some decisions of the Police Court in 
regard to a certain class of cases where they not only furnished liquors, but 
furnished meals ; and the Police Court decided they had a right to open their 
places to furnish their boarders with their meals ; and out of that grew laxity 
in the sale of liquors in those places. 

Q. Whence did you understand was their right to sell ? 

A. It was decided by the court that they have this right. 

A. You know the law is that no man can exercise the right of a common 
victualler without a license ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Has anybody been licensed to do that ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. So, then, you permitted them to violate the common victualler's law 
and sell without a license, and permitted them to sell liquors because they 
were victuallers ? Why were they permitted to go on as common victuallers 
without a license ? 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) At what period of the year, according to your 
recollection, was this effort and success in closing places of traffic on Sunday 
of which you speak ? 

A. I think it was during the summer. 

Q. Was it not during the session of the legislature ? 

A. No, sir; I think not. I think it was during the summer, because I 
recollect the question came up in regard to ice-creams. 

Q. Was it not the latter part of April or the early part of May ? Did it 
not cover about six weeks of the close of the session of the legislature ? 

A. I don't think it did. 

Q. Are you able to say it was not during the latter part of the session ? 

A. I could not say. If I had supposed these questions would be asked I 
could have been prepared to answer them. I came here without preparation. 
If I had supposed this would be the line of inquiry I should have come 
prepared to answer. 



APPENDIX. 153 

Q. You speak of the difficulty of getting convictions. Did you speak of 
the prohibitory law or the nuisance law ? 

A. The prohibitory law more particularly. 

Q. Did you ascertain where the hitch in the legal process was ? 

A. In public sentiment, I think. 

Q. How did public sentiment get hold of the cases in court ? 

A. In the jury. 

Q. The hitch was in the jury ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Were not the juries unanimous for conviction where the evidence was 
clear? 

A. I could not tell. I never went into court. 

Q. Did it in any way come to your knowledge what the difficulty in the 
jury-box was ? 

A. I will state this as an illustration. One year, before a judge, known 
throughout the Commonwealth as one of the most able men, and a man who 
has been a warm advocate of the temperance cause, after I found that con- 
victions had not come, I went to him and said, " Judge, can I do anything 
more as mayor of Boston in this matter ? " and he says, " No ; the same legis- 
ature that passed the prohibitory or Maine law also passed the law that 
juries were judges of the law as well as the fact, and one offsets the other ; 
and so it was understood by the politicians, many of them, who voted for that 
law." 

Q. You felt that nothing could be done ? 

A. I still kept on, but I asked him — 

Q. Did you undertake to raise the question or consider the problem 
whether the jury was made up in a way which would not permit you 
reasonably to expect a conviction ? 

A. I had nothing to do with making up the juries. 

Q. Were you aware whether your co-officials were acting at any time 
with any reference to the point of difficulty, — the disagreement of the juries ? 

A. I think that my associates, or those who were with me in the Board of 
Aldermen, generally felt with me, that it was our duty, it being the law, what- 
ever our views might be, whether right or wrong — it was our duty to do what 
we could to enforce it. 

Q. Are you aware that they were able to succeed in making up a jury 
that had not a liquor-seller in it from 1855 to '65 ? 

A. The board of aldermen have nothing to do with making up juries ; 
that is, a particular panel. 

Q. They had to do with selecting the men from whom juries were drawn 
Into that list of names were they in the habit of placing men known to be 
violators of the law ? 

A. I do not know. I believe they were all honorable men under oath to do 
their duty, and did their duty. The question whether a man was a liquor- 
seller, had very little to do with most of them. It was whether he was a man 
of good judgment, and generally competent to act as a juror. 

Q. It did not make any particular difference whether they were liquor- 
sellers or not ? 

20 



154 APPENDIX. 

A. I do not suppose it did. 

Q. If you could have executed the law you would have been exceedingly 
glad to have done so ? 

A. It would have been our duty if there had been any way. 

Q. It' there had been any way under the law in which you could have 
executed the law, it would have been your duty? Why did you not use the 
seizure clause ? 

A . Because at that time there was some danger of personal responsibility 
under it. I think it had been decided (perhaps those better acquainted with 
the subject can tell better,) in two or three cases in other counties that the 
officer who made the seizure was responsible, and then it was an arbitrary 
act, and was not exactly consistent with our principles and policy of 
government. 

Q. Did you feel that, as officers of the city, you were not financially safe 
in executing the law through that stringent measure ? We are recommended 
to have a stringent law, and the friends of this law suggest that the seizure 
clause is as stringent as you can have, and would like to know why that 
clause was not used. Was this decision such as to make it hazardous ? 

A. That was our impression. 

Q. In what county was that decision given ? 

A. I am not clear about it now. 

Q. Do you believe in the policy of suppressing the sale of liquors as 
beverages ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You have expressed your opinion in favor of a 
license law. I would like to have you give your opinion of the details of the 
law. 

A. I feel that this is not the proper place for me to go into details. I 
should be very happy to sit down with the Committee and consider what 
should be put into this or that section, and talk the matter over, but I 
do not want to commit myself in regard to the provisions of so important an 
Act. 

Q. So far as you feel prepared to give general details, I should like to 
have you ? 

A. My feeling is, that it is a practical question ; that, considering the cus- 
toms and social habits of our people, the fact that this article is used in one 
of the most sacred ordinances of the church, that it is an article of want 
and necessity in almost every family, the only way is, to regulate its sale by 
a proper license law. 

Q. You know that those purposes are provided for especially under the 
present law ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not know that they are. There is a feeling in the com- 
munity against going in that particular direction for those purposes. It is a 
public sentiment. 

Q. Allow me to ask, whether you would license respectable hotels ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. To sell liquor to be drank on the premises ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



APPENDIX. 155 

Q. At a public bar ? 

A. That is a question to be decided by those who draw up such a bill. 

Q. They will draw up a bill which the evidence would seem to indicate. 
We want your judgment whether it is expedient to license hotels to sell at a 
public bar ? 

A. I should think there ought to be easy facilities for strangers and others 
to conform to their customs at home. 

Q. That is, if gentlemen walk in to have a sit down, they should have an 
opportunity of having what liquor they call for ? 

A. I am very little acquainted with any bar-room, and do not know about 
the sitting down and drinking. 

Q. One does not need to have ever been in a bar-room to have an opinion 
on these points. I ask whether you would be in favor of licensing hotels 
with a public bar. I would like to ask — here are some five or six hundred 
grocers for supplying families, respectable grocers — would you think it 
expedient to license them to supply families ? 

A. A certain number of them. ■ 

Q, Have you any idea how many ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you know any reason why one respectable grocer should not have 
the privilege as well as any other ? 

A. The whole matter of the license is for the public good. The public 
good will be promoted by limiting, rather than by having an indiscriminate 
sale. That is the reason we want a license law, to limit the number of sellers 
and the character and responsibility of the individuals who sell. Of course 
the term license — the very idea of a license law is — that there must be some 
persons selected from the community to whom the license is given. 

Q. In the case of grocers, suppose five hundred respectable ones supply 
families, doing the most usefid business that can be done. You would give a 
monopoly to a portion of them ? 

A. Yes, sir. Precisely as you would license people to sell gunpowder. 
You do not license people all along the street to sell that. 

Q. In gunpowder, do they not license any respectable man who wants it ? 

A. I do not suppose the fire department, the engineers of the fire depart- 
ment who have charge of it, would license a large number on one street. ' 

Q. Not if they were respectable ? 

A. They would say, " There is a license here in this neighborhood, and on 
the whole you can't have another license." 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) What proportion of the tenements in this city, 
(suppose there are two thousand of them in this city where there is sale of 
intoxicating liquors,) what proportion of them are owned by the persons who 
carry on the business ? 

A. I suppose a very small portion. 

Q. That is, the real estate is owned by parties who do not carry on the 
business ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are aware that to rent or permit a place to be used for that 
purpose is in itself an offence ? 



156 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. That is, for the landlord ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you ever give notice to the landlords — to the owners of these 
tenements — that illegal traffic was carried on there and order them to see it 
was abated ? 

A. I think the Chief of Police very often took that measure to break up 
disorderly houses. 

Q. Did you ever know a landlord to be prosecuted ? 

A. I think there has been. I am not able to answer the question definitely, 
but I think there has been. 

Testimony of Rev. S. K. Lothrop, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are pastor of the Brattle Street Church ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you lived in Boston ? 

A. Thirty-three years next June. 

Q. As to your observation of the course of the excessive use of intoxicat- 
ing liquors under the operation of the present prohibitory law ; whether it 
has increased or diminished as far as you have an impression ? 

A. My impression is that it has increased; but that is not the result of 
much practical observation or personal experience, because my walks and my 
duties do not carry me where I should see the practical effect of it. It is my 
impression, founded rather on what I read and hear than upon my own per- 
sonal practical knowledge. 

Q. As to your own opinion, if you have formed one, as between a proper 
license law and the present prohibitory law ? 

A. My impression and opinion upon that subject so far as I have formed 
one is, that hardly anything could be worse than the present state of things ; 
hardly any license law could be framed that would not be more operative, 
and therefore more beneficial than a law which is all but universally trampled 
upon. 

Q. So far as you are acquainted with public sentiment within your own 
sphere of association and labors, what is the opinion entertained by citizens 
within your own sphere of observation ? 

A. I should think generally it was the opinion I have already expressed. 

Q. That opinion would lead to a license law rather than the present law ? 

A. I think it would. 

Q, Do you know how strong and general within your own sphere of obser- 
vation this opinion is as to the impracticability of the present law ? 

A. I should think the impression was very strong indeed. I supposed the 
impression throughout the whole Commonwealth was, that experience having 
proved the impracticability of its execution, pronounced the present law 
unwise and injudicious and unjust, because only capable of partial execution. 
I did not know that anybody undertook to maintain now that it was possible 
absolutely to execute the present law upon the subject. I supposed that was 
a foregone conclusion in the public mind. 1 should suppose from my own 



APPENDIX. 157 

observation and reading that the people of the Commonwealth had generally 
reached that conclusion. 

Q. What is the opinion you entertain in regard to the effect of either class 
of legislation upon the promotion of the cause of temperance, a license system 
properly regulated, or the present system as it is ? 

A. I do not know as I have any opinion upon that. I do not think very 
highly of the effect of legislation in promoting the cause of temperance in any 
way. As to the result of my experience for the last thirty-five years, I should 
think that any wise license law would probably have a better effect upon tem- 
perance than the present law. 

Q. So far as falls within the sphere of your own observation, does the feel- 
ing with regard to the present law prevent men from co-operating to restrain 
intemperance by any other means ? 

A . I should think it did to a very considerable extent. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you recollect anything of the history of 
license laws here to know how they operated when they existed ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not. I have not made that a subject of study to any very 
great extent. I have always looked upon the subject of temperance, in its 
moral light, in relation to the moral means which are to be used to promote 
it and prevent intemperance, rather than to the effect of legal means, and 
therefore I confess I signed this petition for a license law because I felt, as 
I have stated, that hardly anything could be worse than what I understand to 
be the present state of things in regard to the existing law. I felt that 
through this petition for a license law some law might be enacted which could 
be executed, and that any law which could be and was thoroughly executed 
was better for a community than a quantity of laws upon the statute book 
which are not and cannot be executed. Nothing is more demoralizing to a 
community, I conceive, than that. With this impression, therefore, and 
without any experience or thorough study of the operation of a license law, I 
signed the petition. 

Q. We had license laws a good many years in this city ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You know nothing of their operation ? 

A. Very little. 

Q. Have you any recollection whether they enforced the law against the 
unlicensed ? 

A. I do not think I have any knowledge or recollection upon that fact. 

Q. You seem to think the law is not enforced at all. Do you know how 
that is in the country towns ? 

A. I do not think I do. I have heard many persons, who I supposed 
knew, say that it was not executed, and whenever I have needed anything 
prohibited by the law in any part of the State where I happened to be I have 
easily obtained it. 

Q. They take special pains to supply clergymen, I suppose ? 

A . I do not know but they do. 

Q. Is it customary with religious conventions to have it supplied to the 
clergy ? 

A. I have never seen it done. 



158 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you noticed anything of the operations of the constabulary in the 
city? 

A. I have noticed the reports in the papers, and have sometimes 
happened to be — once at least I happened to be going "by a place at the 
South End — where a crowd was assembled, and was told that the force were 
making a seizure. 

Q. What do you think of operations of that kind as to the expediency of 
them ? Will they tend to suppress the traffic ? 

A. I suppose it has only tended to suppress it in the particular instance 
where the liquors have been seized and the persons brought before the courts. 
I do not suppose it has stopped anybody else. 
Q. Suppose they go on and seize them all ? 

A. I wish they would as long as the law remains on the statute book. 
Q. On the whole, your idea is that moral means are the best means to 
carry forward this reform ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

' Q. That you cannot expect anything from any kind of law ? 
A. I do not think you can expect a great deal from a law which makes that 
a crime and a wrong, which, in itself considered, and by itself considered, is 
not a crime or a wrong. I do rely upon moral means, principally, for all moral 
objects must be accomplished principally and chiefly by moral means, or by 
the moral influence of the agencies employed. Our government rules, and 
must rule principally and chiefly, by moral agencies and influences, rather than 
by law and force ; and, therefore, I do not think that, in regard to temperance, 
much can be done by law, especially a law so framed that by its enactments 
it makes that to be always criminal and wrong in itself, which, under many 
circumstances, and in and by itself considered, is not a crime and a wrong. 

Q. Do you not think it a wrong for a man to set up a dram-shop and give 
drams to anybody who pleases to come ? 

A. I should not think it a good kind of business ; but if I wanted to pre- 
vent it by law, I think I should rather punish the man who went and took the 
drams than the men who sold them. 

Q. Then the tempter is not so bad as the tempted ? 

A. That does not follow from my position. I mean this : if, for instance, 
I was going to prevent murder by a punishment for it, I would not punish the 
man who made the knife or the pistol that was used in the deed, but the man 
who made an improper use of them in committing the murder. 

Q. Then you consider the keeping of a dram-shop not a beneficial 
occupation for the community ? 
A. No, sir; not particularly beneficial. 
Q. It is evil ? 

A. Yes, sir ; much evil springs from it. 

Q. Why would you not suppress it if it is an evil, if you could do it ? 
A. I think the best way to suppress it would be to punish every man who 
makes an unnecessary use of it. Unless the ground is taken that no man 
ever needs, or may innocently take any stimulants, it follows that there may 
be occasions when he does need and may take them, and therefore it may be 
important or necessary that there should be places where he can obtain what 



APPENDIX. 159 

for the moment he needs. Let those who choose be ready under proper reg- 
ulations, to meet the actual wants of others in this respect. If they encour- 
age abuses I would have them punished ; but I would punish first the man 
who abused himself and his opportunities. 

Q. By that you mean the man who uses it to excess ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Our law does punish those. Some fifteen or twenty thousand a year 
are hauled up and punished ; but is it not a temptation to a man to drink to 
excess if a grog-shop is open at every corner of the street ? Would not more 
men be drawn into that habit, than if there were not such places ? 

A . I suppose there would. 

Q. Then you would not punish the seller as well as him that uses ? 

A. I admitted that I would punish him if he encouraged abuses, but to 
prevent intemperance, I would punish first the man who abused his moral 
freedom by being guilty of it. 

Q. Our laws punish exactly that class of drunkards you speak of. 

A. I am glad they do. This whole subject of course, like every great 
social question, is full of difficulties. I don't suppose we can hit upon any 
plan that will make men saints and angels, entirely prevent all intemperance 
and excess, or change life from what God appointed it to be, a scene of trial 
and temptation, through the discipline of which the individual heart and con- 
science are to form a noble character and attain to a holy life. All that we 
can hope to do through human law, in relation to any subject, is to enact such 
laws, devise such plans as, from experience and observation, we think on the 
whole are the best and will do the most good. A perfect law that shall pre- 
vent all intemperance and do nothing but good, we cannot devise. The pres- 
ent law in this State, seems to me to be a very imperfect one. It does not 
seem to be doing any great good, but much harm. I think that something 
better might be done by a license law, which would aim to regulate and con- 
trol, rather than by a prohibitory law which you cannot execute. That is 
simply my position. 

Q. You rather hope to find something better than the present law, with- 
out any precise knowledge or experience as to the working of a license law ? 

A. Yes, sir. I do not expect much from any law — less from a prohibitory 
law than any other. 

Testimony of Ex-Mayor Joseph M. Wightman. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) When were you connected with the city govern- 
ment in Boston, and how long ? 

A. As member of the School Committee from 1846 to '51. From April 
1856 until '59 as a member of the Board of Aldermen ; and in the years 
1861 and '62 as Mayor of the city of Boston. 

Q. I will ask you to state generally any opinion you have formed from 
your own official connection with the government and the administration of 
the laws, as to the effect of the present law upon the excessive use of 
intoxicating liquors ? 



160 APPENDIX. 

A. According to my observation ever since the establishment of the pro- 
hibitory law, it has been of certainly no benefit to the city of Boston or the 
community, but a great disadvantage to the government of it. 

Q. What is the effect in regard to the increase in the excessive use or the 
quantity sold ? 

A. I have no doubt in my own mind but what the traffic has increased 
rather than diminished from the effects of the prohibitory law. 

Q. Your opinion as to the practicability of the enforcement of the present 
law, by the various civil officers and in the way of the courts ? 

A. So far as my own experience goes in the city government, there was, 
while I was a member of the Board of Aldermen, and Mayor, an earnest 
desire to carry out the laws passed by the Legislature. Arrests were made by 
the police under the orders of the Committee on Police, and also by the 
Mayor. These having been made, were sent to the courts to be tried. The 
accumulation was so great, I recollect, under Mayor Lincoln's administra- 
tion, while I was Chairman of the Board of Aldermen, that the acccumula- 
tion of the cases put before the courts by the police was so enormous, that the 
request was made not to send any more cases in until those had been attended 
to — until they were adjudicated upon. 

Q. All was done that could be, in the way of enforcement ? 

A . I endeavored to do it while I was in office. 

Q. Was any effect produced by your attempt to diminish the traffic ? 

A. I do not think there was, at all. 

Q. What is the public sentiment in regard to that law, as far as you have 
observed it in Boston, and had it any influence on the enforcement of it ? 

A. The public sentiment in regard to a law would, of course, only influ- 
ence the mind of an individual according to the circle or stand-point from 
which he derived the opinion. For myself, I considered, officially, that the 
prohibitory law was obnoxious to the sentiments of the people ; and this was 
expressed clearly, to my mind, in the juries before whom many of those cases 
were sent. 

Q. Have you any statistics as to some of your operations, or any facts or 
letters bearing upon the execution of the law ? 

A. I have. I made it a test question early in my mayoralty. The ques- 
tion came up before the Board of Aldermen. I think the Rev. Mr. Kirk, and 
some four or five thousand other citizens, came before the Board of Alder- 
men on the subject of closing places on Sunday — the saloons, sale of liquors, 
etc. The matter was referred to me by the Board of Aldermen, and in 
March, 1861, 1 requested or gave an order to the Chief of Police to furnish 
me, through the several officers, a statement of every man whose saloon was 
open, and for what purpose, and his name and place of residence. That was 
done. My impression is, the number reported open on Sunday at that time, 
which had become very marked, was 272. The question in my mind then, 
was not whether I ought to enforce the Sunday law, but as to the manner of 
enforcing the Sunday law. I went to the 84th chapter of the Revised Stat- 
utes, and, on examination, I found that the statute then in force was just as 
strong against a man who rode with his wife and children through the streets 
to church, as it was against Peter B. Brigham, who kept a dozen men mixing 



APPENDIX. 161 

brandy smashes and mint juleps on Sunday. The first section was in refer- 
ence to travel on the Lord's Day, except for necessity and charity, for which, 
on conviction, a party was to be fined not exceeding $10. The fourth section 
was, if any man kept his place open for refreshment, selling liquors, etc., he 
was also subject to the same penalty. Under these circumstances, I thought 
a plea made to our citizens, in a spirit of gentlemanly courtesy, would have a 
much better effect than issuing an order through the Chief of Police to 
arrest them. I, therefore, had printed a request, of which this is a copy : — 

" Sir : — By the Statutes of the Commonwealth, which are herewith an- 
nexed, it is made the duty of the Police to inquire into all offences against 
the same, and cause the law to be carried into effect. 

" By a return made to the Mayor, it appears that yon are amenable to the 
charge of violating the law in this respect, and in conformity with the request 
of the Board of JQdermen, and the convictions of the Mayor that the welfare 
of the city requires the law to be more strictly enforced, you are hereby 
requested to close your places of business during the Lord's day, which is 
from midnight on Saturday to midnight on Sunday. 

" The Mayor relies upon your compliance with this request immediately, 
and thus prevent any further action on his part.'* 

This order was issued, folded in this form and sent to every one of the two 
hundred and seventy-two sellers, and the result of it was that, the following Sun- 
day on a careful report, without any further action on the part of the mayor, 
at this request, they were all closed but fifteen. The following Sunday there 
were but five, and two of those were among the most wealthy dealers or 
saloon-keepers in the city of Boston. That continued until the war com- 
menced. In April, after the firing on Fort Sumter, the citizens made a 
request to me that I should not stringently enforce this, for there were no 
Sundays in revolutionary times ; and, therefore, as they were recruiting on 
Sundays, that the places might be suffered to remain open. I did not grant it 
officially ; I did not repeal the order, but I found that then the public sentiment 
was not to regard the Sunday as the Lord's Day, but to continue the work 
of recruiting for the army and keeping places open just the same as usual. I 
am, therefore, satisfied from this in my own mind that our citizens, and my 
experience in all my official life has been that the citizens of Boston are pre- 
eminently law-abiding, and desire to obey the laws. There were in some of 
these cases $70, $80, or $100 dollars profit on the liquor sold on Sundays, yet 
on a mere request, without any force otherwise than as contained in this docu- 
ment, they were all shut up, and willing to be shut up, and obeyed the law at 
once. I therefore inferred that, if a license law was adopted by the legis- 
lature, there would be no place in the State where the law would be 
obeyed with more fidelity than in the city of Boston. 

Q. Have you any doubt as to the practicability of enforcing a license law 
so as to check the improper sale and use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I have not. I was going to observe in regard to a license law, that I 
should hope a license law might be incorporated into the present prohibitory 
law, leaving it to the cities and towns, the mayor and aldermen of cities and 
the selectmen of towns, to regulate this traffic, and dispense licenses according 
to their judgment. 

Q. And leave the prohibitory law against any others ? 

21 



162 APPENDIX. 

A. I think the prohibitory law has been, or the present series of laws 
which culminate in the prohibitory law as the result of a series of legislative 
acts have been, for the suppression of the traffic, very highly perfected. The 
legislature then by engrafting upon them a permissory law like a license law, 
and allowing the discretion to be in the several communities or officers of 
those communities, that then when the conditions of that permission were 
violated, the laws at present existing are amply sufficient for the protection 
of the citizens and the community. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Why do you think the present law, of which you 
just now speak so highly, but which a little while ago had done so much harm, 
would be so cheerfully acquiesced in when you engraft upon it a permissory 
law ? 

A. Because the prohibition or the very element of the laAv would be 
destroyed. The present prohibitory law prohibits the sale under any and all 
circumstances. Of course, the modification of it would be engrafting upon it 
the right to issue licenses. 

Q. That is, you think the license law would nullify and reverse the essen- 
tial principle of the present law ? 

A . Modify it and render it acceptable to the community. 

Q. Is there any provision for the sale of alcoholic liquors for any purpose ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is not license to sell the precise antagonism of the principle of prohibi- 
tion as a beverage ? 

A. In terms they are. 

Q. You propose to engraft a law upon the existing law that shall reverse 
its principle ? 

A. I propose to engraft upon the existing law a principle that will take 
away the entire prohibitory action of the present law and modify it, and at 
the same time hold on to those provisions of the prohibitory law which may 
be found necessary for the carrying of the modified law. 

Q. Under what law were the cases brought by which the courts were 
blocked ? 

A. I have not in my mind the chronology of the laws. 

Q. What was the difficulty in getting convictions at that period ? 

A. The difficulty lies in the juries. 

Q. What appeared to be the difficulty in the juries ? Did the difficulty 
appear to lie in any particular class of juries or portion of them ? 

A. I do not know that I could answer the question, because I have not 
any personal knowledge of the juries. In regard to the juries who tried 
these cases, I could not judge whether they were influenced or not. 

Q. Had you any general understanding at that time as to whether one 
class were less ready to convict than another ? 

A. What do you mean by class ? 

Q-. Men engaged in one kind of business ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think there was any difference in regard to the decis- 
ion of questions before the jury. I do not think, from my own experience on 
the jury, that it made any difference in regard to the verdict of that jury, 
whether there were liquor-sellers upon it in a liquor-selling case or not. 



APPENDIX. 163 

Q. You are not aware during your official labor that liquor-sellers were 
less ready to convict than other persons ? 

A. I should think that those who were not liquor-sellers upon a jury were 
not more ready to convict than liquor-dealers. 

Q. In no case ? 

A. I have known of none. 

Q. Have you never known of a case where there was a given number, 
one, two, or three liquor-sellers on a jury, where they stood nine to three, the 
three being liquor-sellers, or equivalent to that ? 

A. That would involve my experience as a juryman. I have not. 

Q. I do not desire to confine the question to your experience as a juryman 
but to your general knowledge of the operations of juries during the time of 
your official administration. 

A. I have never heard that. 

Q. Have you ever heard that alleged ? 

A. Not from any authority I should regard as worthy of notice. 

Q. Never had any intimation from courts or attorneys that such was 
substantially the fact ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Whether you as an alderman ever had any discussion as to whether 
it was proper to exclude liquor-dealers from the jury list ? 

A. My impression is that at a certain hearing before the Board of Alder- 
men that parties have appeared on such occasions. I think Rev. Mr. Miner 
is one. 

Q. Do you remember anybody else who appeared ? 

A. I do not. I will not say that Mr. Miner did. He was before the 
board of aldermen several times while I was on the board, pressing certain 
temperance views, and my impression is that was one of his strong points. 

Q. Namely? 

A. That liquor-sellers or dealers in spirituous liquors being declared by 
the law criminals to a certain extent that they were not competent and ought 
not to be suffered to be drawn upon juries. That is the impression I got. 

Q. Do you remember the Rev. Mr. Fuller, since deceased, as chaplain in 
the army, being before the aldermen urging those views ? 

A. I do not recollect it. 

Q. You remember the Hon. Mr. Russell ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Those views were distinctly urged. Did you or did you not assent to 
them ? v 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You do not believe it is improper to put liquor-sellers in a jury box to 
try their fellow liquor-sellers ? 

A. Perhaps if I was .counsel in a case or attorney of the Commonwealth, 
if I knew that a liquor case was to come up, and a man who was a known 
liquor-seller with large interests was on the panel, I think I might then as 
counsel challenge him, but it was not in the power nor was it the duty of the 
Board of Aldermen to say that. 



164 APPENDIX. 

Q. But the board of aldermen select, from the whole number of citizens 
in their respective wards, a certain number to act as jurors ? What is the 
provision of the law as to the qualification of the jurors ? 

A. Yes, sir. And in regard to that I will state the exact manner in 
which jurors are chosen in the city of Boston. Early in the year, after the 
election of an alderman, the city clerk furnishes him with or sends to his house 
a notice of the number of jurors that he, as alderman of a certain ward, is to 
select, and a list of the qualified voters of the ward and a directory. For 
instance, as alderman I am required to select one hundred and fifty from 
Ward Ten 

Q. Has it been the custom of the city, as far as your knowledge has 
extended, to furnish the use of a boat which the city owns or has owned at 
some period, plying in the harbor ? 

A. The city has owned what is called the quarantine boat, and also the 
Una. 

Q. Has it been customary to tender the use of that boat to school com- 
mittees, and conventions of various kinds, for excursion purposes ? 

A. It is not tendered. When any body connected with the city govern- 
ment desire to go themselves, or take their friends down the harbor, they 
apply to the Committee on External Health, and the chairman of that com- 
mittee grants it or not. 

Q. Among the refreshments used on those occasions, have liquors been 
included ? 

A. I have no personal knowledge in regard to that, because the matter 
of refreshments is entirely in the control of the committee who have charge 
of the boat. 

Q. Have you any knowledge whether the city has paid bills of that 
character — heavy bills ? 

A. I have no doubt of it. 

Q. Is the same thing done in regard to the committees of the city govern- 
ment ? Bills for liquors are commonly paid by the city treasury ? 

A. I have answered the question as to what my knowledge was. 

Q. I speak now of the committees of the city government ; the committee 
on charitable institutions, for instance. I suppose the same thing is done in 
regard to that committee as you have testified to touching excursions ? 

A. That depends upon the committee. There is nothing that prevents 
their supplying to the boats just what refreshments they please. 

Q. That often happens ? 

A. I have no doubt of it. It depends Upon the character of the persons 
and their desires, and what they call refreshments. 

Q. You speak. of the possibility of enforcing a license law. Do you 
think it would have efficacy because it opens the door for everybody to use 
liquor as a beverage who desire it ? 

A . That is not what I propose. The restriction of the use of spirit as a 
beverage should, as I said, in my judgment, be under the control of such rules 
and regulations as might be decided upon by the mayor and aldermen of 
cities, the selectmen of towns, or the commissioners of counties. 



APPENDIX. 165 

Q My question was, whether the idea of a license law — the fact that 
there was a legal sale for those who desire to drink moderately — was an ele- 
ment that would make it acceptable to the people, and secure the enforce- 
ment of the prohibitory law on the unlicensed ? 

A. I think so. 

Testimony of Rev. Nehemiah Adams, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are a pastor of the Essex Street Church ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been in Boston ? 

A. Thirty-three years next March. 

Q. Have you formed an opinion, from the sphere of your observation and 
the circle in which you move, as to the effect of the present prohibitory law, 
in checking the improper use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. My conviction has been, and is now, that it is a failure, and for the 
reason that it is against the light of nature. From all I have seen and from 
all my endeavors to promote temperance by preaching and in private, I am 
satisfied that the true way to promote temperance, is for the legislature to 
make an enactment for the restriction and regulation of the sale of spirituous 
liquors. I believe in some form of legislation upon the subject. It is a mat- 
ter upon which the legislature can legitimately exercise its authority. As a 
matter of private opinion, I have never been in favor of the expression, 
" License Law." There is a sort of logic in the objection, and we are met 
with the objection that it is licensing sin, and cases that are supposed 
to be parallel are brought up, some of which are difficult ; but a law 
restricting and regulating the sale of ardent spirits, I believe to be the true 
way of preventing intemperance, as far as legislation can do it. I believe it 
would have that effect. One reason why I think it would have that effect, is 
that it would bring religious and moral influences into the field and give them 
fair play. In my own experience, before this prohibitory legislation was 
enacted, I used to see the effect of preaching upon this subject, taking for the 
ground the doctrine of the old Massachusetts Temperance Society, that the use 
of distilled and fermented liquors is never useful to a person in health ; taking 
that as the moral and economical ground. Then as regards the misuse, put- 
ting it on the ground of sin against God — " No drunkard shall inherit the king- 
dom of God," — " Into it nothing shall come that defileth" — and showing what 
debasement of the body, which is the temple of the Holy Ghost and the 
soul, drunkenness is. I have seen the power of these pleas, but when this 
jorohibitory arrangement began we found that the pulpit was entirely useless. 
They would require of us to take certain positions which we were not able to 
take, and it left us entirely in the rear, and it seems to me, the power of the 
pulpit upon this subject, has been entirely neutralized ever since this was 
inaugurated. When a man is at white heat, if you are only red-hot, you 
seem to be cold to him. So with those who go to extreme lengths in 
regard to these matters. If the preacher does not preach or pray according 
to their thermometer, he receives anonymous letters and all sorts of abuse in 
regard to it ; that he is an enemy of temperance and opposed to virtue ; and 



166 APPENDIX. 

so most ministers of my acquaintance have become disgusted with the thing 
and retired from the field. 

Q. I will inquire what opinions upon this same subject are entertained by 
the members and officers of your own church ? 

A. I never had any personal conversation with them on the subject as a 
matter of discussion, but my impression is that they would agree with me in 
this matter. If I am allowed, I will say I think the weight of opinion in the 
clergy of the denomination to which I belong tends in the same way, and 
they are all strong temperance men. I am not acquainted with a man who is 
not a strong friend of temperance in our denomination, and I think the 
weight of opinion among them would all go in that direction. 
Q. What is your denomination ? 

A. We are called Orthodox Congregationalists ; sometimes Trinitarian 
Congregationalists. 

Q. Is your observation in regard to the opinion of the clergy confined to 
Boston, or does it extend through the Commonwealth ? 

A . Through the Commonwealth. I am not acquainted with a clergyman 
of my denomination in Boston who would not agree with me on this point, 
and I have met men from distant parts of the Commonwealth, as well as from 
the interior, who are stronger even than any of my brethren about here. I 
think the strong, sober common sense of the clergy of our denomination is 
that way. 

Q. Were you present at the National Congregational Union when this 
matter of attempting to commit it to the prohibitory law came up ? 
A. I was not present. 

Q. (By Mr. Spoonek.) I understand you to express your approbation of 
the principle of total abstinence upon the use of liquor as a beverage. You 
said that the old Massachusetts Temperance Society took that ground ? 

A. As a matter of expediency, I do not think that the use of it is a sin 
against God ; I do think it is never useful to people in health. 

Q. Did I misunderstand you when I understood you to say as a matter of 
expediency that that is the true doctrine of abstinence ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think it is to people in health. I think every man must be 
the judge whether he is in health, with the advice of his physician. 

Q. I understood you to say, so far as you knew, every clergyman was of 
your opinion ? 

A. No, sir; I said the " weight." In regard to the clergy of Boston, I 
know of no one of my denomination who is not of that way of thinking, and 
I think that the weight of opinion in the Commonwealth is that way of late. 
I think some years ago, (not many years) the opinion was in the other way; 
but I think the result of experiment and experience has led them to this con- 
viction, that the better way to promote temperance is to restrict and regulate 
it, and not totally prohibit it. 

Q. As to the practical matter of the habits of the people, you stated that 
they were all in favor of total abstinence from the use of liquor as a bever- 
age — all in Boston ? 

A. I made a negative statement. I say they are not in favor of the 
prohibitory law. 



APPENDIX. 167 

Q. You say when the prohibitory law came into operation it led to the 
cessation of religious efforts ? 

A. It did, certainly. 

Q. About what time did that occur ? 

A . I am not well informed as regards dates and should not be able to say 
as to the year. It was after the thing had had a full trial. 

Q. Have you not some idea about the date ? 

A . If you will tell me when this legislation began I can tell you in about 
how many years it began to have that effect. 

Q. You recollect how the state of things was twenty years ago ? 

A. I think we were under the regimen of the old Massachusetts Temper- 
ance Society then which comprised the very best sort of men as we all know 
in Massachusetts. I remember reading their debates in this hall with unspeak- 
able interest. There was temperance regulating the whole thing. It was not 
fanatical. It took a common sense and scriptural view of the whole subject, 
and I have always been of the opinion that if that state of things had been 
permitted to continue there would have been a better state of things as 
regards temperance at the present day ; but it immediately fell into the hands 
of zealous men who I think departed from the principles of the word of God. 

Q. Was not this operation of the Massachusetts Society a good deal more 
than twenty years ago ? 

A. I forget. I have not the date in mind. 

Q. Do you recollect anything of the influence of the Washingtonian 
reform upon the ministers engaged in the discussion of this subject, preach- 
ing sermons upon it ? 

A. We all hailed that Washingtonian movement with great pleasure. 
When it began, to see men that were in the depths of degradation rescued 
and appearing before their fellow men to speak in favor of temperance, was 
hailed with acclamation ; but the thing very soon degenerated and we 
abandoned it. It was liable to abuse and it seemed to wear itself out. 

Q. Did not they drive the clergy out of the field ? 

A . No, sir. They have too much sense for that. 

Q. Have you heard many temperance sermons in Boston within a year or 
two or preached them ? 

A. No, sir. I should be afraid to preach in Boston on the present state 
of the subject. They would call me " old fogy " and " behind the age," and 
say, " You know nothing about it." A man would injure his reputation as a 
moral man to preach on temperance unless he went fully into these measures. 
We have endeavored, some of us to plant ourselves on what we consider the 
word of God and believe that his way of legislation is our rule, and that the 
foolishness of God is wiser than man and the weakness of God is stronger 
than man. 

Q. This fear to preach or unwillingness 

A . It is not fear. Do not ascribe it to fear, but a failure to do good ; afraid 
for that reason : that we should not do good, but rather harm. 

Q. Did not that commence directly after the Washingtonian reform ? 

A. I am not able to synchronize the two things. It is in consequence of 
the fact of this prohibitory legislation. 



168 APPENDIX. 

Q. I will ask you if you have preached a temperance sermon, for twenty 
years, to your congregation ? 

A. Yes, sir. I preached a sermon within three years on this subject: a 
dissuasive from strong drink in trouble. 

Q. Did you, previous to that for twenty years, preach what would be 
called temperance sermons ? Twenty-five years ago they were very 
common. 

A. I preach temperance sermons every Sabbath ; but I do not preach total 
abstinence sermons, because I do not believe in the doctrine. 

Testimony of Rev. John E. Todd. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are a pastor of what church ? 

A. The Central Congregational Church. 

Q. What denomination ? 

A. Trinitarian Congregational. 

Q. How long have you been in Boston as its pastor ? 

A. A little over seven years. 

Q. So far as you have formed an opinion within the circle of your own 
observation and sphere of labor, what is the effect of the present prohibitory 
law in promoting temperance or restraining the excessive use of liquor ? 

A. My observation has led me to believe that there never was more drink- 
ing and drunkenness in the city than now ; that it is on the increase. I think 
the prohibitory law has failed thus far to prevent intemperance, and that a 
stringent and wise license law would probably restrain the sale and use of 
liquor more than the present law ? 

Q. As to the effect of this system of legislation and mode of procedure 
under it in withholding the clergy and others from active co-operation ? 

A. I think the clergy and the Christian people of the Commonwealth have 
been deterred and disheartened a great deal by the course which has been 
pursued by some of the most active temperance people. The measures they 
have forced upon the people, and especially the spirit which has animated 
them, has brought that about. I do not think a change of the present law 
would entirely remove the present state of things ; but if we could feel that 
the Commonwealth of Massachusetts has rebuked the extreme measures and 
extreme spirit of some temperance people, we who are in favor of temperance 
would feel more encouraged to take up the cause and push it to the extent of 
our abilities and influence. 

Q. What is the opinion of those within whose circle you move on this same 
subject ? 

A. I have not had any conversation with many of them on the subject. 
If I may judge from the prevalence of the use of liquors, I think the general 
opinion is that liquors ought to be sold or at least purchased. 

Q. How as to the opinion of the officers and members of your church 
on this subject? 

A. The general practice leads me to believe they are not in favor of entire 
prohibition. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You think there is more intemperance than since 
you have resided in Boston ? 



APPENDIX. 169 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long did you say you had been here ? 

A. Only seven years. 

Q. You came here a little before the war ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Don't you think the effect of war is almost necessarily to promote 
intemperance ? 

A. It is to some extent; but I think the influence of the war upon my 
people was to produce a healthier tone of moral sentiment among them. 

Q. Take the world at large ? 

A. I think war may have that effect generally. 

Q. What do you define as temperance ? 

A. I should be very glad to have the sale and use of intoxicating liquors 
entirely cease. That would conform with my belief and practice. How far 
it is best to attempt this by force is another question. I do not think it is expe- 
dient or practicable to enforce a prohibitory law in a community where the 
prevailing sentiment of the people is against it. 

Q. You say your opinion is in favor of abstinence ? 

A. Entire abstinence from intoxicating liquors o€ all kind. I am aware 
that among a certain class an opposite opinion has prevailed. It was owing 
to a misapprehension of some words I let fall once. I am always in favor of 
total abstinence. The misunderstanding that arose came from the fact that I 
deprecated the attempt to force upon ministers the necessity that the use of 
liquors is at all times a sin. I was not willing to do it. I do not believe it is 
the gospel. 

Q. You think a license law would be an improvement upon the present 
law, because you think the present law is not sustained by public opinion ? 

A. I think a stringent license law might be devised that would restrain 
the use of intoxicating liquors more than the present law. 

Q. Your objection is that it is not sustained ? 

A. That it is not sustained. The present benefit I should hope from a 
license law i9 that it would encourage Christian people to put forth more 
moral influence. 

Q. What e ffect would it have to make them bring moral and religious 
influence to bear ? 

A . Under the present state of things all that preach total abstinence, are 
classed with certain individuals who think it is always, under all circumstan- 
ces, a sin to ure, sell or manufacture liquors. If we undertake to preach tem- 
perance we are classed with these individuals. If we can feel that the State 
takes different and more moderate views, we shall be encouraged and feel that 
we have the balance of community on our side. 

Q. Do you not think that there is a, great deal of activity in the temperance 
cause, aside from the law ; sermons preached, societies gotten up and pledges 
taken ; more so than in any time in your experience ? 

A. Perhaps within my experience as a pastor, but certainly not within 
my memory. The majority of the ministers are not so active as they were a 
few years ago. 

Q. How long ago ? 
22 



170 APPENDIX. 

A. Ten or fifteen years. 

Q. That was during the existence of the prohibitory law ? 

A . Within the time since these measures commenced. 

Q. What sort of license law would you have ? 

A. I have not given the subject, which is a delicate one, sufficient thought 
to enable me to go into all the provisions accurately. I would not have any 
license law which would re-open the sale where it has ceased. I should think 
it tyrannous to impose a grog-shop upon a community which that community 
did not want. I should want a license law that would give a town power 
to determine whether it would permit the sale or not ; and I should want a 
license so large, that all the licensed would be interested in suppressing the 
sale by unlicensed parties. 

Q. You want any city or town to have the privilege of excluding or per- 
mitting it as they saw fit ? 

A. I think that would be wise. 

Q. Suppose there was a system of license, and the city of Boston under it 
should vote to have no licenses granted, and the city of Charlestown should 
open a large number of licensed places, would that be fair to the city of Bos- 
ton, where the people ca/i all go over there and get it, drawing people from 
their homes ? 

A. I do not think it would be a good thing, but better than to have the 
same shops open in every street in the city. 

Q. Do you not think uniformity is important ? 

A. Where it is practicable. 

Q. Do you know how many arrests for adultery there have been in the 
city the last year ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Because there are only ten or twenty, — I believe there are a great 
many more, and that crime is hardly to any extent suppressed by a law, — 
would you take off the sanction of the law because it is not enforced, or 
would you have the law express the truth of the matter, and say it was a 
great sin ? 

A. I do not recognize the cases as parallel; adultery and polygamy are 
admitted by the conscience of the whole world or of all civilized nations to 
be sins. The sale and use of intoxicating liquors is a question yet undecided, 
because a large portion of the civilized world do not think there is any sin in 
it. Until the conscience of the world is further enlightened, we cannot put 
the two things on the same basis. 

Q. You think the conscience of the world is against polygamy ? 

A. All of the civilized world. 

Testimony of II. F. French. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You have been connected with the office of 
prosecuting attorney in Boston ? 

A. I was assistant district-attorney for two or three years, ending a year 
ago. 

Q. State your opinion as to the practicability and difficulties of enforcing 
this law. 



APPENDIX. 171 

A. The indictments that were tried in the court while I was connected 
with it were under the nuisance clause almost entirely. 

Q. As to the effect of the prosecutions that were made in checking the 
sale and use of liquor ? 

A. There was no difficulty in procuring convictions under those indict- 
ments that I remember. There were very few if any indictments for selling. 
The indictments were for maintaining places for the illegal keeping and sale 
of ardent spirits and spirituous liquors. My observation would not be worth 
much of itself. My impression from what I have heard is that the sale has 
gone on and almost everybody has sold that chose to ; it has not been sup- 
pressed in this city to any extent. A great many places were shut up, but 
others appeared and the number seemed to be indefinite. 

Q. There was no penalty connected with that portion of the law, of 
imprisonment ? 

A. As I understand it, it is fine or imprisonment at the discretion of the 
court, whereas under the other part of the statute, for selling, the penalty is 
fine and imprisonment. The court must impose some imprisonment with the 
fine, certainly for the second and third offence ; a longer period for each 
prosecution. 

Q. Have you formed any opinion of the comparative value as between the 
present system and a proper system of regulation ? 

A. I had a much longer observation in New Hampshire where I was 
prosecuting officer for ten years and upon the bench four or five years, than 
in Massachusetts. My impression is that in either State the sale of liquor may 
be prevented in country towns under either system ; that you may substan- 
tially stop the sale in the small towns. In the cities you cannot under any 
system ; there will be liquor consumed in a city like Boston in spite of 
legislation. 

Q. Taking public sentiment into consideration which system in your 
opinion would be most beneficial in Boston ? 

A. My impression would be that in a large city like Boston, where I 
assume that you cannot stop the sale of liquor, it would be better to regulate 
it and put it into the hands of persons who might be held responsible, and 
where the quality of the liquor might be tested so they should not sell an 
unusually poisonous article. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Did you ever suppose while making these efforts 
to execute the law that you had the weight of the influence of the city 
authorities to aid you ? 

A. We had never any difficulty in executing the law as far as we 
executed it. 

Q. You brought the cases under the Nuisance Act ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you feel that there was a determination, an honest, genuine 
purpose on the part of the city authorities, to execute the law for the suppres- 
sion of the traffic ? 

A. I had no means of forming an opinion. The cases came through the 
police exclusively, and were supported ordinarily by the testimony of the 



172 APPENDIX. 

police and were entirely clear, and almost every one of them ended in a 
conviction. 

Testimony of Hon. John C. Park. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Have you been connected with the office of 
prosecuting officer in Boston ? 

A. In 1851-2-3. 

Q. You are a practising lawyer in Boston now ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Y. I will ask you to state any opinion you have in reference to this 
subject ? 

A. I do not know what the testimony has been, as I have not read any of 
it. I wish to call the attention of the Committee to one matter entirely separate 
from the questions I have heard answered here. It is the effect of this law in 
an entirely different line of matters ; and to illustrate this effect, I will state a 
case which took place sometime ago, and in which I was counsel. Thomas 
Adams, then sheriff of Norfolk County, attached, as his duty was, as an officer, 
certain property pointed out to him. (The law is that the officer shall attach 
the property pointed out to him.) He attached the stock of a retail seller 
of liquor, advertised it for sale, and sold it. The man who owned the liquor 
complained of him before a police magistrate in Norfolk County for selling 
liquor contrary to law, and he was found guilty, although he set up in defence 
that he acted according to his duty, and he was sentenced to Dedham jail. I 
brought a writ of habeas corpus and brought it before the Supreme Court, 
and the Supreme Court decided that he had no right to sell ; that he was 
amenable to the punishment and ought to go to jail. It so happened that the 
magistrate had sentenced him to Dedham jail and Sheriff Thomas was the 
keeper of the jail. He had got to shut himself in and lock himself in. Under 
these circumstances, the Supreme Court ordered him to be discharged. The 
result of that went further, and put to the Supreme Court the question whether 
an executor or administrator can make an inventory of the estate of a 
deceased ; and that question has recently come up before the court in another 
form in which a part of the Supreme Court have settled, that a man may owe 
for the necessaries of life, if you please, for the board of his family or the 
clothing of his children and may be sued ; and, if he has no property but 
liquors, if he has twenty thousand dollars' worth of liquors, he can take the 
poor debtor's oath and can swear " I have not got property liable to attach- 
ment; " for the oath is that I have " no property exceeding twenty dollars in 
value but what is exempt from attachment." That is the present state of the 
law. The difficulty is, that when you legislate for certain purposes you do not 
see how it will affect other purposes. Take the case of executors and admin- 
istators. Here is a man who dies and leaves little children, and property in 
liquors. How can the executor inventory and charge himself with so much of 
value ? It is not what he can sell, for the law says he cannot sell it. Suppose it 
to be a gentleman who, in his own private cellar, has what the law allows him 
to have, and he dies ; what are you going to do with that ? The administrator 
cannot make an inventory, because he cannot sell it. I point out these 
difficulties to show the operation of this law in another direction. Legislating 



APPENDIX. 173 

sometimes with a view to a particular great object that we have in view, the 
other operations of the law do not occur to us. The Supreme Court, when 
this question came before them, observed that the law was odd, and that its 
operation had not been foreseen ; and, according to the decision lately given 
by Judge Hoar, an officer cannot attach such property at all : that liquor is 
exempt by law from being attached for debt, because, it cannot be sold by the 
officer. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) What is there in the law to prevent a person, in 
anticipation of insolvency, from putting his money in liquor and thus getting 
rid of paying his creditor ? 

A. It can be done. I drafted a law and brought it up in the House, that 
sheriffs, executors, and administrators, those having these things coming into 
their hands by legal processes, should have a right to sell it. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) There was such a law enforced for some years, 
and then repealed, was there not? 

A. While District- Attorney, I formed the opinion, (and it is not a 
mere matter of opinion, but is confirmed by every hour of experience since,) 
that ninety-nine one-hundredths of the crime in the Commonwealth is pro- 
duced by intoxicating liquors ; but the difficulty is, it has increased. The 
sale and use of intoxicating liquor has alarmingly increased, and crime has 
increased. The result of this law has been a demoralization of the public 
mind very much in relation to obedience to the law of the land. Once get 
the public to the idea that such a law ought to be violated, and the public 
mind is demoralized by it. It has been so in this community. The same 
legislation has had the effect to demoralize jurymen's minds under the Nui- 
sance Law. There were indictments under the Nuisance Law. That statute 
declares, that a place being proved to be a place where intoxicating liquor is 
sold, notwithstanding that it is a place of perfect order, there being no proof 
that it hurts a living being, that it produces disorder, crime, or trouble, is a 
nuisance ; and you call upon juries to go out and find, and they are told, if 
you find these facts, you must declare it to be a nuisance. The jury says, I 
am not satisfied it is a nuisance. I will not say a thing is black when it is 
white, because the legislature say it is black. I see it white, and do not be- 
lieve it is black. They would go out and reason in the jury-room, and say, 
The legislature cannot legislate that I, upon oath, shall say a thing is different 
from what it is. It operated badly upon the effect of the legislation ; that I 
found to be the fact by conversation with juries. There is another serious 
difficulty, and that is this : the whole matter is now done in ways of conceal- 
ment and secresy. The^ law is evaded in every possible shape and way, and, 
as is testified by Catholic clergymen, instead of men walking up to the counter 
and drinking, they take it to their homes, and the wives and children and 
people at home get at it, when they would not otherwise get at it. It is 
spreading among the women and children, and a great deal more is used, 
because, instead of going to a bar and drinking, they now take it home, and 
there is more tippling at home ; for a man who does not have a dealer to 
watch him and see that he does not take more than he has paid for, will take 
a larger glass. I will tell you what I think the city of Boston might be. If 
you have your licensed places, the moment you have them, those that are 



174 APPENDIX. 

licensed will do all they can to suppress the other small tippling-shops. Your 
licensed places should not be permitted to be behind screens. They should be 
open to the public, so the public eye can see ; and your young men, who now 
go into back rooms to drink, could do so no longer. Your licenses would be 
taken away from men who did not keep open places. Any one who goes up to 
the bar and drinks must be seen by everybody — by his mother and his sister, if 
they happen to be passing by. In addition to that, give these licenses, and 
your police officers, instead of being disguised, would be right in the room. 
The landlord would not undertake to prevent them, and would not desire to 
prevent them. They could walk up to the bar say, " Don't sell to that man, 
he has been convicted as a common drunkard," or, " He is intoxicated," and 
he would be obeyed. Your police would come directly in contact with these 
men openly and above board, instead of doing as they do now, going in dif- 
ferent uniforms and sitting round. In this way, the whole of this matter 
would be open and above board, and under proper control. I am old enough 
to recollect the days in which it was the law of the land that any person 
connected with a family — a wife that knew that her husband was in the habit 
of spending his earnings for liquor, instead of properly providing for the 
support of his family, for instance — could give warning to dealers and pre- 
vent its being sold to him. I recollect of seeing over the mantel-piece, in 
places where liquors were sold, notices that such and such persons could not 
be trusted. That same thing could be used with great power and force the 
moment you pass that law. Have the licensed men understand that is to be 
enforced. The policemen would be at liberty to go in. They could see how 
the law was obeyed in that particular. They would warn a man, and say, 
" Your license will be revoked or suspended." The licenses should be sus- 
pended as well as revoked. If you put on heavy license, and a man violates 
the law in some slight particular, and the Mayor and Aldermen revoke the 
license, a great ado would be made, and people would say, " It is too slight a 
thing to cause the loss of a man's license." Let the policeman walk up to the 
dealer and say, " You are violating your license : you are selling to a minor, 
to a boy, to somebody who has drank too much, to somebody who has been 
punished for it, to a man who is spending his money in drink, instead of 
using his earnings to support his wife and children," or any of these things. 
The police force would walk up and say, " You are thus violating the law ; 
we shall report you, and your license will be taken away." Do not gentle- 
men believe that if such a law could be put into operation, it would be pro- 
ductive of a different state of things ? I know that some gentlemen think 
that nothing short of absolute prohibition will do it- I think not. I think 
that this thing will be done covertly and secretly, and in the deleterious way 
in which it is now. I should also have the authority given to these very 
police officers to walk up and say, "■ I want to see that glass of liquor. I am 
going to take it to be analyzed. You have been selling poisons, not liquor." 
Our grandfathers did not drink this kind of stuff. My ancestors, who lived 
to be seventy, eighty or ninety years old, every one of them — good old 
Scotch Covenanters — took their regular drink of good old Jamaica rum. 
We have a statute that is a dead letter : " Whoever knowingly sells any kind 
of diseased, corrupt, or unwholsome provision, whether meat or drink," — I 



APPENDIX. 175 

do not believe nine men out of ten know that that word " drink " is there — 
" without making the same fully known to the buyer, shall be punished by 
imprisonment in the jail." Go down to Ann Street, and when a man walks 
up to get a drink, you say, " That is rot-gut," and still, I have no doubt he 
would buy it and drink it. Still, the law of the land is, if he sells without 
telling what it is, you can convict him. One of the great troubles of the 
present day is, the stuff that is sold for liquor. They bring up in the Police 
Court every day people who have not the face God gave them, or anything 
like it. It is not the result of drinking good liquor, but this stuff that drives 
them crazy. They want it, and get it, for the very fact that it is intoxicating 
and makes them crazy. Get a system of license, with the right to seize and 
analyze, and you alter all that. These are my views in relation to what 
might be done. I agree with the gentleman I have heard speak in relation 
to the matter of not putting it upon any country town that does not want it. 
If a country town has excluded it, I do not see why it should be forced 
upon it. 

Q. Should not the laws be uniform ? 

A. In regard to the supposition of the cities of Charlestown and Boston 
being different, I cannot suppose such a thing would take place, but I believe, 
in your small country towns, the establishment of places for the sale of liquor 
would be likely to induce country farmers to leave their quiet homes and go 
down to them and spend their evenings. Let them have the right to exclude 
such places if they see fit. In the city of Boston we must take things as we 
find them, and you have driven liquor-selling not to places where it can be 
regulated, but into places where it is hidden and cannot -be reached, and the 
people come up day after day worse intoxicated and the crime has spread. 
Here is a collateral matter which shows the effect of it. In the days of Josiah 
Quincy there was a part of Boston called Nigger Hill, in which the brothels 
of Boston were congregated. Mr. Quincy determined to break these places 
up, and he went to work and he did it. All these places were broken up and 
the result was they were scattered all over the city of Boston, and you could 
not tell where to look for them. The people that wanted them found them, 
but instead of being kept in one location they were scattered all over Boston. 
Now it is just so in relation to this matter. You have scattered it so that now 
there is no place, where a man goes out to do his day's work, that his wife 
does not get a jug and set up a tippling shop on a small scale. I therefore 
want a license system so regulated in Boston that it shall be directly under 
the surveillance of a spirited, active, and intrepid police. I am satisfied that 
either Colonel Kurtz or Major Jones would carry into effect any such law, 
provided men would come in and point out the course for procedure. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say there is more intemperance than ever 
before ; you say there is more sold and drank than ever before ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. On what fact do you base that ? 

A. On the fact of my every day experience. I can recollect when you 
saw but very little comparatively of this terrible drunkenness. Occasionally 
you would see a sailor just returned from a voyage drunk. Now we take 
little notice of a drunken man and you see men in our police court-room in a 



176 APPENDIX. 

state not to be described. It is terrible to see how completely God's image 
is washed out from the faces of these people. In those days people might 
drink as much but they did not drink such stuff. 

Q. Do you suppose there is as much liquor drank in this country as there 
was forty years ago ? 

A. I am not so well acquainted with this country as some people. I never 
was in Washington in my life. I was never farther east than Bangor, nor 
farther north than St. Johnsbury. 

Q. Are } r ou familiar with the statistics of the manufacture and sale ? 

A . I am not ; I do not drink, buy or sell. 

Q. Should you be surprised if I should say there is only about one-third as 
much drank as there was forty years ago ? 

A. I am not aware of the fact. If that is the fact, I did not know it. I 
I know what I see. 

Mr. Spooner. The statistics show. 

Mr. Park. Do they show it to be so in Massachusetts ? 

Mr. Spooner. I can show you the statistics of that. Have the places 
increased ? 

A. I should think they had immensely. 

Q. Since when V 

A. All the time kept increasing. It is stated that so-and-so has signified 
an intention of giving up the sale. So the number may have decreased, but 
I doubt the sincerity of the parties who say so. 

Q. You recollect that when James T. Austin was district-attorney, the 
population of Boston was about fifty-five thousand. What is it now ? 

A. Between three and four times that. 

Q. Do you recollect that he reported that under the license law six hun- 
dred were licensed and three hundred sold without license ? 

A. I do not recollect it. 

Q. Do you know that Colonel Kurtz, who has one motive to make the 
number as large as possible, reports about fifteen hundred places of sale for a 
population of 250,000 ? 

A. I do not know it. The reports are made by people who are interested 
in making them one way or another. I do not give much credence to them. 
I see what I know that liquor shops are more in the streets, and I see more 
and more drunkenness rampant in the streets. 

Q. You live in Roxbury ? 

A. I do. I am in the city of Boston very little in the evenings indeed. 

Q. Where are your walks except on the direct route ? 

A. Very little, except when I am called out of my office on business. 

Q. Do you go down to Ann Street or North Street ? 

A. Yes, sir. Fort Hill, South Boston and the North End, and the South 
End. 

Q. You know the city has been opposed to the State Police ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. Have you read the report of the Chief of Police ? 



APPENDIX. 177 

A. I read Major Jones' report. He was kind enough to send me one. 1 
have perfect confidence he will do everything he can to maintain the law. 
So I have for Colonel Kurtz. 

Q. You say that it is better for the grog-shops to be open and exposed 
than to have these places in secret. Do you suppose it is possible to have 
these open grog-shops and not at the same time have secret places ? 

A. Just as certain as there is a secret place found the license would be 
taken away. What I propose is that these licensed places shall all be open 
to the public eye ; not to allow them to have any private places. If they 
have, their licenses should be taken away and they be dealt with with the 
severity of the law. 

Q. I ask if you do not suppose if you had open grog-shops, that those 
persons who were ashamed to be seen in the open grog-shops would find 
secret places ? 

A. If they did, the persons licensed would be shoulder to shoulder to break 
up those places. 

'Q. Tell me if you ever heard of licensed parties setting seriously to work 
to suppress the unlicensed ? 

A. In old times I knew it to be so. 

Q. Did they succeed ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Suppose I say the report of Mr. Austin was that there were three 
hundred unlicensed dealers, and that there were heavy bonds given that the 
licensed parties should not violate their licenses, and that in twelve years 
no party was ever prosecuted ? 

A. Then I should suppose they never violated. 

Q. How would a licensed person aid to suppress the unlicensed ? 

A. He would furnish the police with the testimony although he would not 
be known in it. Suppose I have paid a heavy sum for a license. I have 
men all round me selling away my custom. I tell the police of it and they 
will prosecute. 

Q. Suppose Mr. Kurtz says he could find indictments against every man 
who sold in Boston ; what additional aid could the licensed men give him ? 

A. Did he complain ? 

Q. No, sir. t Would he not under the prohibitory law ? 

A. I am not here to give answers about Mr. Kurtz. 

Q. . Is it not practicable for three hundred and seventy-five policemen to 
find evidence ? 

A . They find it to-day and to-morrow it is gone. It is like a globule of 
mercury. Put your finger on it and it breaks and scatters into half a dozen 
fragments. 

Q. Would not the same difficulty exist ? 

A. The licensed men would all be looking after it and when a license law 
is established you will find public sentiment different. We are in a desperate 
situation, and some step should be taken to alter it. It is well worth the 
experiment of trying. 

Q. Have you read the police reports the last four or five years ? 
A. No, sir. 



178 APPENDIX. 

Q. You heard that not only the number of places have decreased, but also 
that the cases of drunkenness have decreased ? 

A. If the courts say so I must take facts for facts, but I do not believe it. 
It has never been so bad as it is now. I am sure of that. 

Q. You are in favor of open grog-shops ? 

A. So the public can see what is going on in them. 

Q. You are in favor of that ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. It is better you think that a man should go in and take a glass of 
liquor openly ? 

A. If we had the power it would be better to make every man in the city 
of Boston a total abstinence man, but we have got to deal with society as we 
find it. 

Q. It is better to have grog-shops where a man can go and get a glass of 
liquor than that he should buy a larger quantity and carry it home, and it is 
better to have it open because less evil would be done. 

A. Certainly, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) You said, in the first of your examination, that you 
would have a large amount paid for the license ? 

A. Yes, sir,. 

Q. You would have that done as a matter of revenue ? 

A. I have my own opinion about that. The State of Massachusetts wants 
to do something about equalization of bounties. We do not want to tax 
ourselves four or five millions to do it. Your little towns do not want a 
license. Go to your country towns and say, " We are going to license rum, 
but you shall not have it in your town. The Boston liquor-dealers are going 
to pay for that license. Let us take the money received for license and apply 
it to the equalization of , the bounties to our soldiers." Do you not think they 
would send representatives here to vote for the license? We want the 
soldiers to get their money, but I know the people do not want to pay the tax 
necessary to do it. If we have got an evil which regulated will give us that 
tax, I do not think it will be any more dirty if it goes into the treasury and 
then to the soldiers, than if it was paid to anybody else, the superintendent 
of schools, if you please. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you not know that that bait has been thrown 
out to the people of Massachusetts ? 

A. I do not know it, but I am glad to hear it. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) I understood you to state that one objection to 
the present law is, that it does not authorize the officers of the law, sheriffs or 
executors, into whose hands this species of property may come, to sell it law- 
fully. Do you believe that that is a correct announcement in the sixth section 
of the law ? Do you believe that that announces the truth ? 

A. I cannot exactly understand it so. My definition of a common nui- 
sance is, 

Q. Do you think that all intoxicating liquors kept for sale in violation of 
law, are common nuisances ? 

A. Any violation of the law is a public detriment. Whether you would 
call it a nuisance or not, is another thing. If you ask whether it is a detri- 
ment or not, I say yes. 



APPENDIX. 179 

Q. My question is this : Do you think that all intoxicating liquors kept for 
sale in violation of the law, are public nuisances ? 

A. I think they are not ipso facto common nuisances. I think that the 
legislature went too far when they undertook to declare it was a common 
nuisance. If you said it was a public detriment, I should have said yes ; for 
every evasion of the law is a public detriment. 

Q. I understand you to say you would, to-day, make every man a total 
abstinence man ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You, therefore, believe all use of intoxicating liquors is an abuse ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Is not that which is uniformly injurious a nuisance ? 

A. I would not say that. I think a great many men could do without it. 
I know men who cannot do without it. 

Q. Is not the very definition and idea of a common nuisance that which is 
uniformly hurtful ? 

A . I do not think so. Uniformly hurtful to the community, not to the 
individual. 

Q. Have you not said that all use of intoxicating liquors is hurtful ? 

A. To the individual. I do not say to the public. 

Q. If a thing is hurtful to all individuals, is it not to the community ? 

A. That is your reasoning. It is not mine. 

Q. That is, that which is hurtful to everybody, is not hurtful to the 
community ? 

A. It may be hurtful. 

Q. Whether it is any hardship for the law to declare that that which is a 
common nuisance shall not be sold ; and if that which is a common nuisance is 
in the possession of one man, and he can make no lawful use of it, what use 
could his heirs make of it if they should get it ? 

A . I only spoke of the practical effect. 

Q. You said you were old enough to remember when the law authorized 
wives to prevent sales to their husbands : do you not know that is part of this 
very law ? 

A. It may be. I hope it will stay there. • The licensed men will be very 
careful to observe it. In regard to the injurious effect of the use of liquor, 
Dr. Kirkland, of Harvard College, was accustomed to have with his dinner 
his glass of wine. After he ceased being president he was not well in some 
way, and his physician told him he must abstain entirely from that glass of 
wine. My father, who had been for many years of his life a surgeon and 
physician of some -credit, found that to be the fact, and he told him, " Mark 
my words, you who have not drank to excess will have a stroke of the palsy just 
as sure as you alter your course of living." Dr. Kirkland said he must obey 
the instructions of his physician, and before six months he had a stroke of the 
palsy. I say, although it may be deleterious to some, it is not to others. As 
men grow older I think they require a little more stimulus. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Is not that a condition induced by the course of 
living ? 



180 APPENDIX. 

A. It may be ; so with my grandfathers, that took it readily. It may be 
induced, but they lived to a good old age. 

Testimony of Hon. Henry W. Paine. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where did you live at the time the Maine Law 
was passed in the State of Maine ? 

A. I lived in the State of Maine. 

Q. Were you a member of the legislature ? 

A. Not when the first so-called Maine Law was passed. I was a member 
of the legislature when the second and more stringent law was passed, in 
1853, 1 think. 

Q. As to the effect and operation, so far as you have observed it in 
Maine, of the Maine Law ? 

A. I have never had anything to do with any attempt to enforce the 
Maine Law. It happened to me to be prosecuting officer for a county when 
the law of regulation was in force, and I have had occasion to reflect some on 
the subject. I remained in the State four or five years after the passage of 
the first Maine Law. I was not able to perceive that there was any decrease 
of the use of spirits, and I believe such was the general remark of those who 
had better opportunities or as good as myself. 

Q. So far as you have observed the operation of things in Massachusetts 
what is the effect of ours ? 

A. My means of knowledge are limited. If you ask me whether the law 
may be enforced, I have no means of knowing that it may not be, in parti- 
cular cases. If you ask me whether the law, thus far, has had the effect to 
diminish the sale of ardent spirits, I should say, from limited experience, but 
from considerable observation, that it had not. 

Q. That law was passed by the legislature. Are there any facts within 
your knowledge, whether it was the embodiment of the sentiment of the 
State of Maine at the time it was passed ? 

A. My conviction was, it did not embody the public sentiment of the 
State of Maine. It was unfortunately mixed up with other issues, and in 
that way, as it seemed to me, it came upon the statute-book. My conviction 
is, if there were any real, substantial difficulty in obtaining ardent spirits, this 
law would go by the board. It is because this law is practically inefficient 
that it is tolerated, because it seems to me that there is a very much prepon- 
derating opinion, so far as my observation has gone, that the legislature are 
trespassing on private rights: while the great mass of the citizens look 
upon the excessive use of ardent spirits as a tremendous evil, they' feel that 
the moderate use is beneficial, and that when the State undertook to restrict 
them in the use of what would be beneficial to them, because others may use 
the same thing to their own detriment and the detriment of the public, they 
have gone farther than they have a right to go ; that is the feeling, as it occurs 
to me. 

Q. You have said in your opinion, it was not the deliberate judgment of 
the people of Maine. Was that generally understood throughout the State ? 

A. I think it was. 

Q. What effect did it have in securing respect to the law ? 



APPENDIX. 181 

A. It was not treated with much respect ; it was regarded as another law 
passed in Maine, called the one-dollar law, which prohibited every man from 
passing or receiving a one dollar bill ; but, I believe, everybody that could 
get hold of one, took it readily. 

Q. If you have any opinion upon the present state of things here, as to 
the relative value of legislation in checking intemperance between a license 
law and a prohibitory law, please state it ? 

A. Nothing further than the result of my own reflections on the subject. 
It has seemed to me that a law regulating the sale would be productive of 
good ; whereas, as it seems to me, with all deference to others of different 
opinion, the present law is absolutely pernicious. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say the Maine Law did not, in your judg- 
ment, effect any curtailment of the use of intoxicating drinks in Maine ? 

A. My judgment would be, that there was not a gallon of liquor drank 
less by reason of the law. 

Q. Where did you live ? 

.4. In Hallowell, on the Kennebec River, two miles from Augusta. 

Q. Have you observed particularly the statistics of crime and pauperism 
in Portland for years after the Maine Law came into operation ? 

A. I did partly because I had had a great deal to do with enforcing 
former liquor laws and for some years I endeavored to inform myself from all 
sources available as to the operation of that law. The precise details have 
entirely gone from me after this lapse of time. 

Q. Do not you recollect that the statistics of crime and pauperism showed 
a decrease of more than one-half for a year or two ? 

A. I recollect it was so stated with great confidence and also contradicted 
with great confidence. 

Q. Who said it and who contradicted it ? 

A. Upon the side of those who advocated the Maine Law it was contended 
that it had the effect of reducing pauperism and crime, and statistics were 
published with a view to sustain their side, and on the other hand from gentle- 
men who had equal knowledge, equal opportunities of knowledge, I derived 
the information that those statistics were fabulous. I do not mean to say 
they were intentionally erroneous but were colored by the imagination of the 
men who got them up. 

Q. The statistics of courts are clear and distinct. They are not so affected. 
They show a certain number of men convicted of larceny and other crimes. 
Of course those statistics are to be seen. They cannot be reduced. 

A. Whether there are more or less convictions in a given place at a given 
time depends not only on the number of offences but upon the vigilance of 
those who look after and prosecute them. 

Q. You give the idea that the sentiment of the people of the State was 
not in favor of that law at any time, but that it was brought about by various 
circumstances and not the actual expression of the people of the State ? 

A. That is my deliberate judgment and I could give details if time 
permitted in support of that judgment. 

Q. How long ago was that law enacted ? 

A. My memory is that the first law passed in Maine by the two houses 



182 APPENDIX. 

■was in 1850. That law met with an executive veto. At the next session in 
1851, a law was passed by both branches and ultimately received the signa- 
ture of the Governor — but living in the immediate neighborhood I had no 
doubt whatever that there was an attempt on the part of certain members o*" 
the Legislature to put the Governor, whom they wished to kill off, in a fix. I 
think that was one inducing cause. Then the two particular parties were 
driving each to get the advantage of the other, and the Maine Law was the 
stalking horse of both parties. 

Q. Did the Democrats declare themselves in favor of the Maine Law ? 
A. No, sir. Nor did the Whigs as a party, but each was unwilling that 
the other should have this handle of addressing itself to a certain class of the 
community. 

Q. In which party do you belong ? 
A. I was counted as a Whig in those times. 
Q. Did you ever belong to the Republican party ? 
A . No, sir, never. 

Q. How long have you been in Massachusetts ? 

A. I removed from Maine in 1854, but my business called me for the fol- 
lowing three or four years to Maine the larger part of the time ; so it is only 
since 1858 that I have resided here. 

Q. I believe the first law was passed in '48 or '49 ? 
A. The law that did not take effect by reason of the Governor's veto. 
Q. I think the law came into force in '49 or '50. We passed ours in '52, 
and that was induced by the operation of that in Maine. 
A. I may be mistaken about the dates. 

Q. I want you to explain this phenomenon. Here is a law passed sixteen 
or seventeen years ago in Maine, and it has been a matter in politics every 
year. It still is on the statute-book. It has been contested continually in 
politics and yet remains there. Is not that about as strong evidence that it is 
an expression of the opinion of the people as it could be ? 

A. I think not. It was a law on the statute-book of England until the 
coming in of this century, that larceny of a few shillings should be a capital 
offence, and juries could not be found to convict for that offence, showing that 
public sentiment was against it. 

Q. Did that law ever get into the politics of that country ? 
A. Their mode of conducting political canvasses is different. • Samuel 
Komilly had to fight down a great deal of prejudice and bring the people to 
his assistance, before he succeeded in repealing this obnoxious provision. The 
difficulty in Maine is, that the statute stands there because it is inoperative, 
and people who desire to sell, prefer it to a regulating law. 

Q. Are they not enforcing it at present to a great extent as far as you 
hear? 

A. My intelligence from there on this particular subject, is not particu- 
larly recent. I have not been in the State to stop for three years, and it 
may be so. There have been spasmodic attempts to enforce that law, from 
time to time, but they have been spasms followed by no permanent results. 
Q. Has it not been in elections ever since ? 
A. I am not aware of it. 



APPENDIX. 183 

Q. Was not Governor Smith elected because of the revulsion of feeling ? 

A. There has not been a governor of that namo elected there within 
twenty years. I am not aware that any governor has been elected in that 
State upon that issue. I do recollect that a gentleman was put in nomination 
for that office in Maine, and it was rumored he was not a temperate man, 
and a temperance man was put in nomination. 

Q. Do you not recollect there was a mob in Portland where the military, 
by order of Neal Dow, shot a man ? Do you not recollect that that got into 
politics, and the Democrats carried the next election, and elected Governor 
Wells ; and do you not recollect that under Wells the license law was enacted ? 

.4. There was another law substituted for the Maine Law, and I supposed, 
(and I think, there can be no doubt about it), the reason of the failure of 
Governor Wells was not that law, but the fact that the Legislature had under- 
taken to remove a member of the Supreme Court, as the people thought, 
wrongfully, and the Governor acquiesced, and made the removal. 

Q. That carried Wells into office ? 

A. He was elected before ; that carried him out. 

Q. I asked if the consequence of that mob of Dow's did not put him in ? 

A. I do not think it did. I do not think that mob made five hundred votes 
difference in the vote of the State of Maine. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Aside from that, a license law was enacted and 
repealed subsequently ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What we want to get at is, was not that a fair expression of the opinion 
of the people of Maine ? 

A. I should say so, if the question had been put nakedly before the peo- 
ple ; but I am not aware that it was ever made a distinct issue in Maine ; that 
it was mixed up with other issues, is very true. 

Q. What is your opinion on the question of total abstinence ? 

A. My conviction is that a large portion of the community, sensible, 
reflecting men, are of the opinion that the moderate use of ardent spirits is 
beneficial, and that every man ought to be a judge for himself whether it is 
beneficial and proper for him, and of that number I am one. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Would the witness give, under a license law, power 
to interfere with the principle of leaving every man to drink when and how 
much he pleased ? 

A. I have already said that I think the sale of ardent spirits should be 
regulated, because, when it is used to excess, we all concede that it is not only 
injurious to the individual, but invades the rights of society, which society has 
a right to protect. The precise line is difficult to draw. 

Q. Do not taxes to repair the ravages of intemperance infringe the rights 
of the individual ? 

A. No more than taxes to repair the damage caused by any other crimes. 
When this crops out to a crime ; when it becomes an annoyance to the public ; 
when society becomes a sufferer by it, then society has a right to step in and 
say, " Thus far and no farther.'* 

Adjourned. 



184 APPENDIX. 



SEVENTH DAY. 

Friday, March 1st, 1867. 

Testimony op Host. George Washington Warren. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Give your residence and official position at the 
present time ? 

A. I am a resident of Charlcstown and Justice of the Police Court in 
Charlcstown. 

Q. How long have you held that position ? 

A. The court was established in 1SG2. I have held that office for five 
years, and before that time I acted as Justice of the Peace. 

Q. How long have you been connected with the various offices ? 

A. I was Mayor during the first four years, — from 1847 to 1850 inclusive. 

Q. I wish to ask your opinion, so far as you have been able to judge from 
your oflicial positions, of the effect and influence of the present prohibitory 
liquor law ? 

A. I was in the Legislature for the first time, in 1838, and gave my vote 
for the temperance law at that time, and voted to incorporate a temperance 
society. The passage of that law was considered at that time a great desider- 
atum, and for the benefit of the temperance cause, and in deference to the 
judgment of older persons than myself, I voted for it. I have watched the 
operation of the law ever since. I have devoted considerable attention to 
the subject of legislation upon the matter of temperance. I became satisfied 
during that session of the Legislature, as I became better acquainted with the 
tendencies of the law, that it was injudicious. The law, it seems to me, is 
contrary to the actual public sentiment of the people of the Commonwealth, — 
that is, it is in opposition to the practices of the people, because it is based 
upon the idea that intoxicating liquors can in no way be used as a beverage. 
There arc now no means of purchasing liquor legally, unless it is bought of 
the importer, as the only provision in the law for its sale is by agents, who 
are restricted to the selling for mechanical and medicinal purposes only. I 
believe that a majority of the people do use it in other ways than for mechani- 
cal and medicinal purposes. It is used, for instance, for domestic purposes. 
I think such a state of things tends to a certain extent to create a want of 
respect for authority, and for law. A law of this kind is opposed to the pre- 
vailing habits of the people. I think that I have seen many instances in 
which that appears. If you will allow me, I will give an illustration. I 
recollect that in 1817 the question of licenses came before the Legislature. 
The city government of Charlestown voted for a license ; the city of Boston 
against a license. That same year there was a visit of the President of the 
United States, to Boston. Out of respect to that vote, at the public dinner 
given to the President, there was neither wine or spirituous liquors upon the 
table. It was a cold water dinner, although in all other respects, it was as 



APPENDIX. 185 

expensive a dinner as could be provided. But afterwards, in the private 
parlors of the citizens of whom the President and suite were guests, spirituous 
liquors were furnished. It was made a subject of remark by numbers oi 
Congress, afterwards, that it was a queer way of doing, for the authorities to 
withhold wine at an entertainment of that kind, and afterwards, in the private 
rooms, assent to its use. They would have much preferred taking the glass 
of wine at the meal, to taking it afterwards and in private. I think that 
such exhibitions as that do more to create a general disrespect for law, than 
a proper recognition of the habits of the people. Although I voted for the 
prohibitory liquor law, yet I became convicted, while I was in that Legisla- 
ture, that I ought not to have voted for such a law, unless I was satisfied that 
a majority of the people had come to the point of total abstinence from 
intoxicating liquors. When a majority of the people adopt total abstinence 
as the rule of practice, then a prohibitory liquor law will do, but if the people, 
in their general habits allow the use of wines and liquors in certain forms, 
cither for medicinal, mechanical or culinary purposes, then it seems to me 
injudicious to attempt to have a prohibitory law. 

Q. What is the effect, within your own sphere of observation, of the 
present hnv, in respect to the use of liquors ? 

A. I do not think the law has produced any effect in the use of liquors in 
private houses, and at entertainments. I think the habits of society are no 
more tending towards temperance — strict temperance — total abstinence — 
now than they were twenty-five years ago. If I may judge, I think that 
there are more families that do not adhere to the rule of total abstinence, 
now, than there were twenty-five years ago. 

Q. How in regard to the prevalence of intemperance ; has it been checked, 
or otherwise ? 

A. I do not think, sir, that it has been checked. 

Q. Has liquor been publicly sold in Charlestown ? 

A. I understand that it has been. I took occasion to inquire of the 
collector of the internal revenue taxes how many licenses had been granted In 
Charlestown by the United States authorities, and he said there were two 
hundred, who had paid licenses of twenty dollars each. It struck me as an 
anomaly that the general government should be dealing out licenses, (and 
many who take them really believe that it gives them authority to sell liquor,) 
and the State government at the same time having a prohibitory liquor law. 
I think that there should be a co-operation between the general and State 
governments in the matter of temperance. If the determined policy of the 
State is for a prohibitory law, the Acts of Congress should coincide with that 
policy. 

Q. Is intemperance increasing or diminishing in Charlestown ? 

A. I should say that it did not diminish. Our population is a fluctuating 
population. I do not think that among the settled population there are a 
great many cases of intemperance, but I do not think that it is diminishing. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Did you say that two hundred licenses have been 
granted in Charlestown the present year ? 

A. I asked the collector yesterday, and I understood him to say two 
hundred. 

24 



186 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you think, at this moment, that there are two hundred or more 
places of open sale in Charlestown ? 

A . I do not know, sir. I know that there have been several cases brought 
before the court, and prosecution has been sustained according to law. I do 
not know how many there are in operation. 

Q. How do you generally find persons when brought before the court for 
violations of the law, — are they disposed to contend or to adjust the case ? 

A. I should think that about one-third of them were in favor of adjust- 
ment, and the remainder enter an appeal. They may adjust after an appeal 
to a higher court. That appeal may be with a view to await the action of 
the authorities at Washington, and sometimes it may be in the hope of chang- 
ing the testimony by a lapse of time. 

Q. Not, however, in the hope of escaping by any such change ? 

A. No, sir; I suppose not. It is generally done by the advice of counsel. 

Q. Do you think that the feeling of the dealers of Charlestown, at this 
moment, is that they are oppressed by the law, or do they feel that the law is 
in triumph over them, and that they must bow to the law ? 

A. I cannot tell. I have had no conversation with dealers in relation to 
it, and do not know what their opinions are. 

Q. What would you infer from the fact that one-third of the cases of viola- 
tion are adjusted ? 

A. There is a feeling of tenderness, of course. 

Q. Was the penalty, in the case of those who were ready to adjust, pretty 
uniformly imprisonment, as well as fine ? Were they second cases ? 

A. No, sir ; I think they were first cases. 

Q. That shows, then, still more clearly, the feeling that they must submit 
to the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. I have no doubt that the law could be enforced in Charles- 
town. 

Q. And the traffic suppressed, or as much so as crime in general ? 

A. Yes ; there would be some devices, however, to evade the law. 

Q. Do you think that there would be any substantial distinction in the 
degree in which this law could be enforced, as compared with the laws 
against adultery, gaming, or counterfeiting ; that is, so far as the suppression 
of the open sale of liquor is concerned ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Your recommendation of the license law is based, then, not on any 
inability to execute this law, but upon the fundamental rights of individuals 
to the moderate use of beverages ? 

A. Upon the custom of the people, connected with the right. 

Q. Would you pursue a policy that would perpetuate all the social evils 
attending the use of liquors, merely in conformity to an existing custom which 
has no principle to stand upon ? 

A. Of course not. 

Q. Then, when you speak of the right and privilege of individuals, in the 
moderate use of liquor, would you speak of the duty of moderately using 
alcoholic beverages ? 



APPENDIX. 187 

A. No, sir; but I think that the duty of total abstinence has yet to be 
established. I think it cannot be assumed. I should go for the protection of 
minors and young people, and for any legislation that protected them. 
Q. Why, then, would you subject minors to the deprivation of a good ? 

A. I would do it for the same reason that I would keep a child under 
control in the use of his property. He is not a judge how far he can go. 
Q. But you would not neglect to clothe and feed the child ? 

A. Of course not, but I would teach him moderation in all things. 

Q. You would give him all of his property that his personal good required ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. AVould you give him, while a minor, liquor as a beverage, upon the 
same principle ? 

A. No, sir ; I should advise every young man to abstain. 

Q. My point is this : that if the moderate use of liquor is a good, why 
deprive minors of it ? 

A. Because they may not 

Q. be fit subjects for a blessing ? 

A . No, sir ; but because they are not old enough to decide for themselves. 
I think a parent should direct the conduct of his child in all things, — in dress, 
in eating, as well as in smoking or drinking ; that he should prohibit those 
things. But when a child arrives at age, I would leave it to him to decide 
whether he should smoke a cigar, or drink a glass of wine. 

Q. I agree with you that the parent should direct the child while incom- 
petent to decide for itself; but my question touches upon the principle 
involved in that decision. Why should a parent decide to exclude his child 
from good, or good from his child ? 

A. The parent is the guardian of the child until the child arrives at the 
age of discretion, then the child must decide for itself. 

Q. I understand you to regard the use of liquor as a good, or to require 
the opposite to be established ; and I ask why you would not give it to a 
minor ? 

A. I think it should first be established that the temperate use of intoxi- 
cating liquor is an evil. 

Q. You think that it is a good ? 

A. I think that the evil should first be established. You assume that, from 
your point of view. 

Q. You assume, then, that the evil of the moderate use of intoxicating 
beverages must be established, and until it is established, you assume such use 
to be a good. I stand upon your assumption, — it is a good ; and I ask, why, 
then, exclude children from the enjoyment of that good ? 

A . For the same reason that I would direct them in everything else. They 
are to be taught moderation. 

Q. You do not exclude children from the good of knowledge, of food, of 
clothing, of medicine, when sick? 

A. We direct their reading and studies. 

Q. And you direct them to good books ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. And to good food and drink ? 






188 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Why not give them all kinds of good food or good drink ? 

A. You would not indulge a child in the free use of money, although 
when he becomes of age, he may be entitled to the possession of a large 
property. 

Q. You spoke of culinary, and other subordinate uses of alcoholic prepa- 
rations, the deprivation of which is an inconvenience. Do you consider the 
inconvenience of such deprivation, when compared with the existing social 
evils flowing from the drinking usages of society, as worthy of mention ? 

A. Yes, sir; and I think such inconveniences should be recognized by the 
Legislature in the framing of a law; but at the same time the abuses of 
drinking should be guarded against. 

Q. The legitimate use of liquors for mechanical and medicinal uses, is 
recognized now ; but how would a license law prevent all the existing evils 
that flow from the moderate use of liquor ? Out of moderation comes 
immoderation, and the totality of the social evils of live. 

A. I think that there could be a license law by which discretion could be 
invested in some proper authority, by whom victuallers, &c, could be licensed 
to sell liquors with their meals. I think that dram-shops should be discoun- 
tenanced. 

Q. What is the substantial difference between liquor-drinking in a 
victualling-house and liquor-drinking in a dram-shop ? 

A. There, I think, you go to the foundation of the matter. I think there 
is a peculiarity of our people as distinguished from others in foreign countries. 
How it has come to be so, I cannot tell, but in travelling abroad you find very 
few drunkards and very few dram-shops. 

Q. My question is, what is the difference, in principle, between liquor- 
drinking in a saloon by the wayside, as a man passes to his business, and 
drinking in the place where he takes his dinner or lunch ? Do you make a 
discrimination between the two ? What is the difference in principle ? 

A. If you ask me the tendency of the custom, I can give you an answer 
The excess makes the difference. 

Q. But why is there likely to be any more excess in the dram-shop by the 
wayside than in the dram-shop where the victuals are kept ? 

A. A peculiarity of our people explains that. In a dram-shop, where 
persons loiter their time, and drink without taking any food with their drink, 
the habit of intemperance is formed ; but where a person takes, occasionally, 
a glass of wine with his food, as does the person who has occasion to go to a 
drinking-house for a meal, the effect is different. 

Q. Can you put anything into a license law that will prevent people from 
calling at eating-houses, if it be also a dram-shop, and getting their drams ? 

A . You could frame snch a law. 

Q. I should like to see the draft of it. You spoke of the majority of the 
people of Charlestown using liquors in their families. Do you mean the ma- 
jority of the people of the circle in which you most affiliate, or the majority 
of the people — the middling ranks of the people of the city ? 

A. Well, sir, I should think that the majority of the people used it in 
some form. 



APPENDIX. 189 

Q. The question refers to its habitual use as well as to an occasional use ? 

A. I suppose, to put it in another form, that the majority of the people 
are not total abstinence people. I do not, myself, habitually use wine or 
liquor: a week may pass without my taking a glass of wine ; but, at the same 
time, if I have a friend visiting me, I put some good wine on the table. I do 
not use it habitually, however. I presume there are many others who use it 
in like manner, and who do not adopt total abstinence as a rule, or adhere to 
the law of temperance. 

Q. By which you mean the moderate use ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. You spoke of a visit of President Polk to Boston : who accompanied 
him? 

A. The Secretary of State, Mr. Buchanan. 

Q. Do you know whether President Polk, himself, in the private parlors 
where he was invited, and where you say liquor was furnished, partook of 
liquor ? 

A. I recollect seeing him take a glass of wine. 

Q. Are you very confident upon that point ? It is generally understood 
that he was a total abstinence man ? 

A. I know that he did. 

Q. Are you aware of the habits of the then Secretary of State in that 
respect ? Did he drink more freely, or less so, than the President ? 

A. I do not mean to say that either drank freely. 

Q. Both drank in moderation ; you do not intend to imply more than 
that ? 

A. I recall the circumstance of drinking a glass of wine with the Presi- 
dent myself. I took no note of the others, but I remember that fact. 

Q. Do you think it a matter of censure, under any aspect, that the au- 
thorities of Boston or of Massachusetts, on such occasions, should omit to 
furnish liquors for the public table, even though they should use it privately ? 

A . That is a question for them to decide upon. I merely meant that it 
was an occasion of remark abroad, and rather a reflection upon the people 
and authorities, that they should be inconsistent. 

Q. I will ask one other question, with the leave of the Committee ; it is 
this : Whether in the judgment of Justice Warren, our legislation upon the 
matter of social evils should' be upon the level of the lower class of society, 
and of the more questionable habits of the people, or on a level with a higher 
and more moral class, and safer, worthier habits ? Should the laws, upon 
such subjects, be a little below or a little above the prevailing tone of public 
sentiment ? 

A. I think the laws should be up to the public sentiment. 

Q. Do you not think the law a great educator ? 

A. Of course. 

Q. Do you not think it desirable that total abstinence should be made the 
practice of the people of any and of every community, as far as possible ? 

A. Yes, sir ; but I doubt whether law can make it so. 



190 APPENDIX. 

Q. If the existing prohibitory liquor law could be executed, and it should 
result in total abstinence from intoxicating liquors as a beverage, do you 
think the effect upon the community would be otherwise than good ? 

A. I think that, under the existing state of things, the law being so much 
in opposition to the prevailing habits of the people — of all classes of society 
— that it creates a disrespect for law, and for authority generally. 

Q. You think then such a Taw could not be executed ? 

A. There would, of course, be no opposition to the execution of the law. 
I think that the authority of the law officers can always be maintained. 

Q. Speaking of disrespect for law ; do you think that a law, embodying the 
truth, though violated, will create as much disrespect for law, as one embody- 
ing an error, although it be obeyed ? 

A. I do not see the application of the question. 

Q. In what district is Charlestown, as respects the assessment of licenses for 
the sale of liquors ? 

A. No. 6. 

Q. In the whole district, the number returned as having licenses, is 197 ? 

A. That is for the new licenses. 

Q. No, sir ; for the United States licenses of last year ? 

A. Mr. Wilson, the collector in Charlestown, told me that there were two 
hundred. He may be mistaken. 

Q. You spoke of licenses being granted in 1847 in Charlestown and not in 
Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you think, if the reverse were the case, — if Boston licensed and 
Charlestown did not, — that the fact of Boston granting licenses would affect 
the temperance cause in Charlestown ? Suppose that Charlestown wished to 
suppress the traffic, would it be the more difficult if licenses were freely 
granted in Boston ? 

A. I think there would be no great inconvenience resulting. When the 
authorities of one place refused to grant licenses and the other granted them, 
I do not think there would be any practical difficulty. 

Q. You do not mean to say that liquor would be had more freely than it 
would be otherwise — more than it would be if Boston did not license, but 
took the same ground that Charlestown was supposed to take in the 
question ? 

A. I do not think that would affect the obtaining of liquors. 

Testimony of John Kurtz. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What position do you occupy in Boston ? 

A. I am Chief of Police. 

Q. How long have you held that position ? 

A. Four years. 

Q. During the period of your holding office, will you be kind enough to 
state what has been the state of things in regard to the drinking and selling 
of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. Be a little more definite, and I will answer directly to the question. 
; Q. What is the number of places in Boston where liquor is openly sold ? 



APPENDIX. 191 

A . In December last, the number of open places for the sale of liquor, was 
1,515. I have here the statistics for a number of years past. 

Q. Be kind enough to give them ? 

A. In 1854, 1,500; 1855, 1,621; 1856, 1,927; 1857, 1,995; 1858, 1,9-10; 
1859, 2,018 ; 1860, 2,220 ; 1861, 1,904 ; 1862, 1,870 ; 1863, 1,951 ; 1864, 
1,857; 1865, 1,712; and in 1866, 1,515. 

Q. These are all public, known places of sale, are they ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you know the place and number of each ? 

A . For the last three years, we have kept the name and place of business 
of every man reported. 

Q. Have you reason to believe that there are secret sales in addition to 
these ? 

A. We have reason to believe that recently a great deal more liquor is 
sold secretly than before. 

Q. How recently do you mean ? 

A. Within the last two years ; more particularly within the last year. A 
brewer, a short time since, told me that his trade was very much changed ; 
that now he gets a great many more orders from private families than 
formerly. He says that in the first place a family begins by ordering one keg 
of lager at the latter part of the week ; soon they will want two kegs per 
week ; thus gradually increasing until finally they order six or eight kegs to 
keep them over Sunday. 

Q. Do you know what kind of people he referred to ? 

A. I think, from what he said, that the families he alluded to are princi- 
pally German, — those who drink lager. 

Q. Have you any means of forming an approximate opinion as to the 
relative quantity of liquor sold and drank privately by being sold to families ? 

A. I have no means of ascertaining that. 

Q. Can you give any statistics of the cases of drunkenness that have come 
within the knowledge of the police ? 

A. I can give you statistics back as far as 1854. The number of arrests 
made, and of persons brought to the station-houses in different degrees of 
drunkenness, in 1854, was 6,983; 1855, 6,987; 1856, 6,780; 1857, 8,720; 
1858, 8,930; 1859, 9,634; 1860, 13,157; 1861, 17,324; 1862, 14,904; 1863, 
17,967. 1863 was my first year in office. I found that all persons then 
brought into a station-house, whether they were partially or wholly drunk, 
were put down as arrested for drunkenness, and it seemed to me that that was 
not the proper way to dispose of them, but that they should be separated, and 
that none should be set down as arrested for drunkenness, except those who, 
according to the law, were to be sent to the court. I accordingly ordered 
that of those arrested, the partially drunk should be separated from those 
who were staggering drunk. The court requires us to swear that a man 
is staggering drunk before we can get a warrant. If a man was partially 
oblivious, we kept him until he was sober and then sent him home. In 1864 
only those were put down as drunk who were sent to the court. The rest 
were put down as " lodgers." All who were arrested for drunkenness and 
sent to the court, were approached by an officer for the purpose of getting 



192 APPENDIX. 

their evidence against the places where they obtained their liquor. Each was 
asked, according to the prohibitory law, where he got his liquor. If he would 
disclose, he would be taken as a witness, and not be proceeded against for 
drunkenness. The officer having that matter in charge is summoned here, 
and can testify in regard to it, but my impression is that he never found one 
who would make such a disclosure. They had rather be proceeded against 
for drunkenness than disclose the place where they get their liquor.. In 1864, 
with that separation, we reported 2,561 as arrested for drunkenness. We 
estimated the number of those reported as lodgers, but who were more or less 
intoxicated, as being 12,000, which would make the total number arrested, as 
compared with former reports, 14,561. In 1865, we arrested 5,725 for 
drunkenness, and estimated the number arrested as partially intoxicated as 
7,000, which would make the. entire number 12,725. In 1866, the arrests for 
drunkenness were 5,752, and the number of those arrested as partially drunk, 
9,000, making the total 14,752. 

Q. Have you any means of finding out, with any degree of accuracy, the 
number of places where liquor is secretly sold ? 

A. We never have made any attempt to ascertain. I do not know what 
we might do if we were to try. 

Q. Has the number of such places increased during the last year ? 

A. We have reason to believe so from the reports coming to us, but not 
from any statistics that we have taken. I presume that our only way to get 
that information would be to make the acquaintance of the families where it 
was sold or used. I do not know how such an attempt might turn out. 

Q. I will ask you under which system, or a modification of which system, 
you think you would be best able to restrain the excessive use and sale of 
intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I do not understand that question. 

Q. What in your opinion is your ability, as things now exist in Boston, 
to enforce the present law ? 

A . My individual opinion is, that if a combined effort upon the part of 
the public, generally, was made to close all open sales of liquor, to a certain 
degree, it would be successful. 

Q. Why cannot the police do it alone, without any combined effort upon 
the part of the public ? 

A. Simply because public sentiment is against such an attempt. I think 
that it would be morally impossible for the police to enforce any law that was 
in violation of public sentiment. 

Q. What is your opinion in regard to the estimate in which this law is 
held in the public opinion ? 

A. I should judge that it was very unpopular. 

Q. Suppose the present law were changed and that restricted permis- 
sion be given to retailers to furnish intoxicating drinks, what then would be 
the tendency of the law in breaking up the secret sale of liquor ? 

A. I think such a change would be an advantage. I think public opinion 
would sustain the police in punishing all violations of the law if there was a 
reasonable opportunity of obtaining licenses. 



APPENDIX. 193 

Q. I desire to ask you a question of fact, as bearing upon the question of 
public opinion, whether during the time you have held your present official 
position, there has been any combined aid given to the police authorities on 
the part of the public, in the enforcement of the present law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How far has the city government, unaided by public sentiment, 
endeavored to enforce this law ? 

A. Since I have been in office ? 

Q. Yes, sir. 

A . During the first year of my being in office, we made complaints 
against parties under the Nuisance Act ; before I came into office, attempts 
had been made, as the records show, to enforce the prohibitory law, but the 
jurors would not agree ; the business of the courts became clogged ; the 
police furnished the courts with so many cases and the juries failing to agree, 
but little business could be done in the courts, and the district-attorney 
requested one of my predecessors not to make any more complaints. There 
was a test case made up. My deputy made up the test case, and he will tell 
you, I think, that the counsel for the 

Mr. Morse suggested that if the deputy was here, he should testify in 
regard to that case. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What number do you say you have on your 
list, reported as selling liquor in 1854 ? 

A. 1,500. 

Q. And how many in 1866 ? 

A. 1,515. 

Q. How many cases of drunkenness were there in 1863 ? 

A. 17,967. 

Q. How many in 1866 ? 

A. 14,752. The years 1861, '62, '63 and '64, were the war years, as we 
call them. There was rather more license given during those years than 
there was before. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) There was probably more intoxication during 
those years than there was before or since ? 

A Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What was the proportion of drunkenness before 
and since the war ? 

A. In 1859, 9,334 arrests were made. In 1860, 13,157, and in 1866, 
14,752. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you recollect the population in 1860 and 
1866? 

A. The estimated population of Boston in 1860 was 177,902, and the 
census in 1865 gave 192,324. 

Q. You stated that public opinion was an obstacle to the enforcement of 
the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How does that public opinion manifest itself ; how does it interfere 
with you ? 

25 



194 APPENDIX. 

A. It manifests itself in various ways. We find temperance people, — 
people who come up before this Committee, and sit around here with them, 
patronizing places where liquor is sold, in preference to places where liquor 
is not sold, and where people are trying to keep temperance houses. That 
is one way in which public opinion manifests itself. 

Q. How does that interfere with your operations ? 

A. It interferes in this way; when people in general, by their acts and 
practice, go directly in opposition to the law, people who are jurors, do the 
same thing. 

Q. That is to say, because the world is wicked, you cannot enforce the 
laws ? 

A. I do not mean to say that. The world has always been wicked yet 
some laws have been and can be enforced. 

Q. We will admit as much wickedness as you please, but how did it 
directly interfere with your operations ? Please state what obstacle appeared 
in consequence of that ? 

A. I told you that we made complaints under the prohibitory law but 
the juries would not agree, and consequently the business of the courts 
became clogged. We could get convictions readily under the Nuisance Act ; 
we had no trouble about that. I was myself some six months on the jury 
in 1860 and we had several cases under the Nuisance Act, but I think none 
under the prohibitory law. My recollection is, that we had three liquor-dealers 
upon the jury, and they never failed to vote to convict where there was 
evidence under the Nuisance Act. 

Q. Would they fail to convict under the Common Seller Act ? 

A. I could not judge, because we never had a case under that Act ; but I 
presume, from the action of juries in former times, they would have failed to 
convict. I sent a great many cases to the grand jury, both last year and the 
year before, under the Common Seller Act, but the grand jury found bills 
under the Nuisance Act, and I was a little surprised (as I had complained of 
them under the Common Seller Act, and had evidence to convict them under 
that Act) that the jury should bring in indictments under the Nuisance Act, 
and I made inquiries to know why it was. The district-attorney told me 
that the grand jury thought that they would indict those who ought to go to 
the House of Correction, under the prohibitory law, and those that they 
thought did not need to go there they would bring in under the Nuisance Act. 

[Mr. Spooner stated that, speaking for himself, he considered the diffi- 
culty in obtaining convictions from the juries, under the prohibitory law, an 
excuse for the inaction of the city government in enforcing that law.] 

Q. I understand you, then, that you could get convictions under the 
Nuisance Act ; that there was no particular obstacle in the jury to convic- 
tions under that Act ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How many cases have you brought before the courts in a year under 
the Nuisance Act ? 

A. Within the last year ? 

Q. In any year since you have been in office. 



APPENDIX. 195 

A. My impression now is that we calculated to give the court some four or 
five cases for every day they were in session — as many cases as we thought 
they could get through without interfering with the business of the 
court. 

Q. The penalty was fifty dollars at first, was it not ? 

A. I think the penalty was at the option of the court. 

Q. Until the last two years, was not that the penalty generally inflicted 
by the court ? 

A. I could not answer as to that. 

Q. Do you recollect testifying before the legislative committee two years 
ago the same thing as you now do, that it was easy to convict under the 
Nuisance Act, but impossible or very difficult under the prohibitory law ? 

A. I think I said something to that effect. 

Q. And you testified that you thought that the jury would bear a heavier 
fine than was inflicted, which was $50. You thought the jury would convict 
if the fine was $200, and you recommended that sum ? 

A. I think that I did. 

Q. A law was passed in conformity to your suggestion. We want to know 
what the trouble is with that law, and to learn whether another would work 
better. We want to know whether there has been any serious effort to put 
down the liquor traffic under the existing laws. Will you please state how 
many cases you have presented ? Have you the statistics with you ? 

A. No, sir. When the Constabulary was organized, the friends of the 
Constabulary force were very desirous that it should be established on a firm 
footing. They had a reputation to establish, and they wished us to help them 
establish it. They sent for His Honor the Mayor and myself, to confer with 
them upon the subject. They stated that this force had been organized for 
the express purpose of enforcing these peculiar laws — the nuisance law and 
the prohibitory liquor law. They wished the exclusive privilege of taking all 
the cases that came under those two laws, leaving the police to attend to the 
other business. We were disposed to give them an opportunity to establish 
their reputation, and we agreed that they should do that kind of work, and 
that we would not interfere with them, but would give them any assistance 
that we could to help them establish their reputation, that the force might be 
perpetuated. Consequently, we have not exerted ourselves in the matter, but 
have given all such cases to them. 

Q. I mean previous to that time, while you were in office ? 

A. While I was in office, we made complaints under the Nuisance Act. 

Q. How many complaints ? 

A. We calculated to give the jury four or five cases per day, during their 
session. 

Q. How many would that amount to per year ? 
A. Between four and five hundred. 

Q. I believe that by the reports of the last three years, they do not exceed 
in any year three hundred ? 

A. It may be the reports do not show all the complaints ; they show all 
the arrests. I think we made more complaints than there were arrests. 



196 APPENDIX. 

Q. You may have made complaints to the Grand Jury, and they did not 
find bills ? 

A . Probably that was so. 

Q. Was that true to any considerable extent ? 

A. I do not know that it was to any great extent, but I spoke of it as 
explanatory. 

Q. Your report, for the last three years, shows that you have not made 
more than three hundred arrests for a year, although there were fifteen 
hundred or two thousand known dealers ? 

A. If that is true, the reports show it for themselves; I have not got 
them here. 

Q The reports show that. I want to know if you consider that a serious 
effort to enforce this law ? 

A. I do not know that I should consider it a serious effort, if we had set 
ourselves about it. If we had had nothing else to do, we would probably 
have done differently ; but we had a great many other cases to attend to. 
The people make a great many complaints against the police now. They 
complain that the police officers are not seen in the streets often enough. 
They cannot be in the streets and in court at the same time. 

Q. How many police officers have you ? 

A. We have now about two hundred and seventy-one ? 

Q. Is it not three hundred and seventy-one ? I think that three hundred 
and seventy-one are reported ? 

A. I think not ; we have reduced the force. 

Q. Reduced it since when ? 

A . We have reduced it recently, by discharging men not thought to be 
proper persons to be on the police. 

Q. Why have you not filled their places ? 

A. His Honor the Mayor will tell you the reason. 

[Col. Kurtz subsequently corrected his statement by saying that the 
present number of the police force was 271, the full number being 385.] 

Q. You thought this matter of so little consequence compared with your 
other duties, that with your whole force you have made but these few arrests ? 

A. I do not know that we thought it of no consequence, but perhaps we 
had other business of more consequence. 

Q. I say compared with other things you had to do, a habit that is beg- 
garing one-fourth of the community, taxing people to a very great extent, 
causing untold misery, causing the arrest of fourteen or fifteen thousand 
drunken men per year, is not of sufficient consequence to induce the police to 
make a serious effort to remove the evil ? 

A. Those are your statistics, not mine. I do not give as evidence that 
those things are true. 

Q. There is a statement in the Advertiser that there were 14,752 arrests 
in 1866 for drunkenness. I would like an explanation of that. I suppose 
that they here consider as arrested for drunkenness all those that have been 
taken up ? 

A. I have not seen the article. Perhaps the gentleman who wrote it can 
give you the information. We reported 5,752 persons as having been 



APPENDIX. 197 

arrested and sent to court who refused to disclose where they got their liquor, 
and were fined for drunkenness ; and we estimate that 9,000 of those who 
were reported as lodgers should be added to that number as being partially 
inebriated ; that would make the number 14,752. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Under your system of making returns, 14,752 
would be returned as the whole number ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that whole number is to be compared with the whole number 
prior to that time ? 

A. Yes, in order to have a fair comparison. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You have observed the operations of the State 
Police, and know that there have been a great many convictions obtained by 
that force in the city of Boston, and that seizures have been made to a great 
extent ; why did you not do the same thing before the existence of the State 
Police ? 

A. I could not find any one that would stand at my back and protect me 
if I did. I think that I once made the offer to you, to go and take any place 
you would designate, if you would agree to stand at my back and protect me 
from any proceedings that might be instituted. You declined to do it, how- 
ever. 

Q. Do you think, Colonel, that I have to stand behind the State Police ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Why was it more necessary for me to stand behind you than to stand 
behind them ? 

A. Because I felt that I had given bonds, and my bondsmen were liable 
for my acts. The State Police give bonds to nobody. I preferred' you, or 
somebody who believed in the law, should be my bondsman rather than my 
own, who do not believe in the law, and would not stand by me. 

Q. You did not believe in the law, and therefore thought that it should 
not be executed ? 

A. I did not believe I ought to jeopardize my bondsmen. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) If you seize liquor you do it by proper legal pro- 
cess, and if you do it by a proper legal process and in a proper way, how do 
you incur any liability ? 

A . I have been told by very eminent counsel that it was pretty dangerous 
business, and that the least mistake would make me liable, and I did not like 
to undertake it. 

Q. But suppose that you did not make a mistake ; suppose that you pro- 
ceeded according to the law, you then incurred no liability ? If you take the 
process provided by law you incur no personal liability ? 

A. But I did if I made any mistake. 

Q. Now, do you think that any bond given by Mr. Spooner, or by any- 
body else, to indemnify you for doing an illegal act, would be of any value to 
you? 

A. 1 felt that it would. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What sort of a license law would you have ? 

A. That is a pretty nice question ? I prefer to leave it to other gentlemen 
to answer. 



198 APPENDIX. 

Q. These gentlemen (the Committee) are mostly from the country. The 
petitioners ask a license for the city, and chiefly for the benefit of the city. 
Now, the country gentlemen, I doubt not, want to understand the necessity 
for a change, and what sort of a law the city people want to meet their case 
and I would like for you to give your idea, as near as you can, of what you 
think would be a suitable license law. 

A. It is a matter that I do not now wish to give my ideas upon. If the 
gentlemen from the country, when they are framing the law, wank to get any 
humble ideas that I may have, I shall be glad to give them, but I do not want 
to give any particular ideas now. 

Q. The people seem to want a license law, but none can tell what they 
want in a license law. 

A. What I want is, that all evils, of whatever name or nature, may be 
brought out to the view of the public, so that the police, or anybody else, can 
go in and see what is going on, without the trouble of swearing out a search- 
warrant. Take the matter of pawn-brokerage, for instance. Before they 
were licensed the police could not find stolen property. Since they have been 
licensed the police have authority to go in to their shops, examine their books 
and anything upon their premises without any ceremony. They can go in at 
any time, whenever they please. Since pawn-brokers and second-hand dealers 
have been licensed, thieves can no longer " fence " stolen property with them, 
but must carry it somewhere else. I think that the more you open these 
things to the public and to the police, the greater is the advantage. 

Q. You are not prepared to suggest the details of what you would consider 
a proper license law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You spoke of the number of prosecutions under 
the Nuisance Act. As the result of these prosecutions, have the number of 
nuisances decreased in Boston ? 

A. I think they have. Whenever we found that a place was a nuisance, 
we followed it up until it ceased to be a nuisance. 

Q. Do new nuisances come in their stead somewhere else ? 

A. Undoubtedly they do. 

Q. Has the whole number, then, been diminished ? 

A. Not to any great extent. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you not conceive it within the power of your 
police to find sufficient evidence of the fact of sale, in any case, when you 
believe a sale of liquor exists ? 

A. We never have had any difficulty in getting evidence. My deputy will 
tell you of a case where counsel acknowledged that thirty sales were made 
within an hour, and in which pay was received, and the case went to the jury 
with that acknowledgment. 

Q. I understand you then, that it is practicable to find evidence against 
anybody that sells ? 

A. There is no difficulty about that. 

Q. Suppose that you had a license law, and one or two hundred persons 
licensed in this city, would those licensed persons, be able to render yon any 
service in enforcing the law ? 



APPENDIX. 199 

A. I think they would. 

Q. What could they do ? 

A. They would give us information that we could get nowhere else. 

Q. But you say that you can find information now, without their aid. 

A. I tell you that public sentiment would sustain the law then, and people 
would have no sympathy with those who were unlicensed. 

Q. But you said that the police can find evidence against any person 
suspected. 

Mr. Andrew. You misunderstood him. He referred to places that had 
become public nuisances. 

Mr. Spooner. No ; he said that the police could find evidence against 
anylody that sold. 

Q. I ask you again, if you were satisfied that any person sold liquor in 
any place, if you could find sufficient evidence to convict him ? 

A. I should try. How I should succeed, I could not tell until I had tried 
it. We never found any difficulty in getting sufficient evidence where there 
was a nuisance. 

Q. But where you believed that there was a sale, — call it what you will — 
a nuisance, or a violation of the prohibitory law, you stated a few moments 
ago that you believed that you could get evidence against anybody that sold. 

A. No, sir ; I did not testify to that. You misunderstood me. You may 
have quoted me so, but I did not say so. 

Testimony of Hon. Alpheus Hardy. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are one of the first petitioners, are you not ? 

A. I signed one petition. I do not know whether it was the first or the 
third. 

Q. Will you be good enough to state what it is that you desire in that 
petition ? 

A. I desire a law that shall command public respect and public support, 
and that shall suppress the sale of liquor in a hypocritical, hidden, secret, 
deceptive way. 

Q. Will you tell what restrictions you would impose ? 

A. I would not have any open bar in the Commonwealth. I would not 
allow a hotel to sell a glass of liquor to any passer in the street, nor to any 
persons except to guests of the hotel. If a guest required a bottle of wine, I 
would give him permission to sell it under stringent and healthy restrictions. 

Q. How long have you resided in Boston ? 

A. For thirty-six years. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state what is your opinion, and from your 
intercourse with the business men of Boston, what is their opinion, as far as 
you know, of the present prohibitory liquor law? 

A. The business men of Boston, so far as I know them, think that the 
present prohibitory law is not productive of good morals, and they believe 
that a large portion of the illegal sale of liquor is produced by orders from 
the country, where men preach temperance, but come here and practise 
drunkenness. 



200 APPENDIX. 

Q. With regard to persons who heretofore have co-operated with you in 
your own sphere of operation, — in temperance measures, in moral measures 
for the suppression of intemperance, what is their present status ? 

A. Formerly the religious and moral members of the community led the 
reform, and it was well led. Ministers, members of churches, well-wishers of 
society who were not members of churches, preached temperance and stated 
facts, the results and misery of intemperance, and such preaching and state- 
ments were effectual ; but since it is " Be it enacted," instead of " Thus 
saith the Lord," a great many men have ceased their efforts, because they 
cannot follow the extreme measures which they deem detrimental to the 
cause of temperance, and injudicious. 

Q Have you any facts in regard to the feeling of clergymen of your own 
denomination and of other denominations ? 

A. I think that the clergymen of my own denomination, in the large 
cities, do not consider the present prohibitory liquor law as best "adapted to 
promote temperance. 

Q.. Is there any evidence at the present time, of any change of public 
sentiment, to which you have alluded, in regard to the execution of the 
present prohibitory law ? 

A. The only evidence, and perhaps the best evidence that I could furnish, 
is the fact that several gentlemen who were in the Legislature when this 
prohibitory law was enacted, or when the " fifteen-gallon law " was enacted, 
have said to me that they voted for those laws, but that their experience and 
observation since have taught them that they made a mistake, and they 
agreed that there was a necessity for a change, although they did not dare 
come out and say so for fear of the blackguardism that would be heaped upon 
them in certain circles and by certain gentlemen. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You spoke of worthy clergymen of the city 
formerly leading the temperance reform ; upon what basis did these gentle- 
men lead the reform ? 

A . They led it by stating facts, by exhibiting the evils of intemperance 
and convincing men that it was wise to be temperate and correct in heart and 
principle, as far as possible. 

Q. To be moderate in the use of alcoholic beverages, do you mean ? 

A. Some would say moderation, and some, total abstinence. 

Q. The clergymen you speak of as having formerly led the reform are 
now divided ? 

A. Some go for total abstinence, and some for moderation in the use of 
liquors. 

Q. I am aware that clergymen were always divided on that subject, but 
you spoke of a class of clergymen who formerly led the reform, but have 
retired from the work since law has been employed. I ask you if that class 
of clergymen led the reform on total abstinence grounds, or upon the ground 
of moderate use. 

A. Some on one ground, and some on the other. 

Q. Will you name one who stood upon the total abstinence ground md 
has retired from the work ? 



APPENDIX. 201 

A. I should not be willing to do it by name unless compelled by tlie 
Committee. 

Q. But you are sure that you know such men ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When you speak of the temperance reform, do you speak of some 
doctrine that has risen in later years, or of a doctrine that has been always 
received and acted upon ? 

A. I speak of a doctrine as old as the Bible. 

Q. You speak of a doctrine which nobody ever denied, namely, that 
people should not be drunkards ? 

A. That is a rule laid down in the Holy Book, and I shall always believe 
in it. 

Q. And everybody believes in it. You do not know of anybody that dis- 
believes it ? 

A. No, sir. And I should be very sorry to know of it. 

Q. Did you ever know of a liquor-dealer who advocated drunkenness ? 

A. I never heard of one. 

Q. Nor of a drunkard who did ? 

A. I never heard of one. 

Q. Then the clergymen who led the reform stood upon no other ground 
than that stood on and advocated by the liquor-sellers and the inebriates 
themselves ? 

A. I cannot speak of that, sir ; I cannot tell what they stood on. 

Q. What was there in the enactment of a prohibitory law that should have 
compelled the clergymen to withdraw from the field ? 

A. They believed that the law was taking the great moral question of 
temperance from the field of morals, and putting it in the field of law, where 
it did not properly belong. 

Q. Are you not aware that a large proportion of the clergymen of your 
own denomination, and others, believing that the temperance reform should 
be advanced, have worked all the more heartily, and are to-day as ardent, 
active laborers as any clergymen ever were ; who do not feel the law an 
obstacle, but, on the contrary, feel that it helps to hold what shall be gained 
by their moral efforts ? Are you not aware that a large body of clergymen 
of different denominations, your own included, stand in that position ? 

A. I am not aware of it. 

Q. You are, personally, deeply interested in the temperance reform ? 

A. I am, and always have been. 

Q. How long have you been a pledged man, if I may ask ? 

A. What do you mean by " pledged ? " 

Q. Pledged to total abstinence. 

A. Since I was old enough to know what it meant. I have never touched 
liquor as a beverage, and never allowed its use in my family. 

Q. If prohibition could be made and continued the policy of the State, 
and the prohibitory law made effectual in suppressing the open sale of liquor 
until a generation should have grown up under habits of general abstinence, 
would you not think that a desirable state of things had been achieved ? 
26 



202 APPENDIX. 

A. When you shall produce a generation that shall thus abstain, you will 
have accomplished a great work. 

Q. Do you not think it possible ? 

A. Not by the present prohibitory law. You have got to take hold of the 
hearts and principles of men to achieve such a result. 

Q. But what is there in the present law that prevents honest laborers from 
taking hold of the hearts of men ? 

A. Public sentiment is not yet prepared for it. 

Q. Would you drag down the higher elements of public sentiment to a 
level with the lower ? 

A. No, sir; hence I would not have this law. 

Q. Do you believe that embodying into a law what you do not believe to 
be the true policy, namely, the granting or licenses for the sale of intoxicating 
beverages for the public good, a more moral law in its influences than a law 
based upon a doctrine that you do recognize ? 

A . My position upon that question is this : — We cannot get present per- 
fection, and I would, therefore, take the next best thing. 

Q. The Divine law recognizes the fact that there is sin in the world, but 
the Divine law does not lower it ? 

A. That is a proposition in divinity that you are probably better able to 
state than I am. 

Q. Why should not human law imitate the Divine law, and stand on the 
truth embodied in it ? 

A. That is just the position that I take, — that we should imitate the 
Divine laws in our human laws. I think that the Jewish commonwealth was 
better governed than any other people except ourselves, and we are 
approaching their government. 

Q. Do you think it desirable to have the Jewish commonwealth and its 
laws, instead of a Christian commonwealth and its laws ? 

A. By no means. 

Q. Why, then, did you adduce that ? 

A. Because the Jewish law was the best law for them, as they were then; 
but as they advanced in Christian liberty and knowledge, the Christian 
religion became a better law. 

Q. Is the Christian religion a compromise with evil, as compared with the 
Jewish law ? 

A. By no means ; it is an advance 

[Mr. Andrew objected to further testimony on this point, as not pertinent 
to the question at issue.] 

Q. Do I understand you to say that it is a desirable state of things that a 
community should be brought to total abstinence ? 

A. Yes ; but I do not say that a man may not be an honest Christian and 
yet make moderate use of wine. I do not say that total abstinence is a duty 
for everybody. I make it the law for myself; but I do not say that every 
man should make it the law for himself. 

Q. Turning from this subject; having seen your name connected with some 
business transactions involving an interest in this trade, if it is agreeable to 



APPENDIX. 203 

yourself and to the Committee, I should like to ask a question on that point. 
Are you the lessor of a place of business in which liquor is sold as a beverage ? 
A. I am the lessor of a building in which liquor is alleged to be sold as a 
beverage, but I do not know it as a fact. 
Q. You refer to what house ? 
Mr. Andrew objected to the question. 

Mr. Hardy asked leave to make a personal explanation in reply to the 
question. 

Mr. Aldrich. Since the question has been asked, the Committee think it 
proper, if Mr. Hardy so desires, that he should have an opportunity to explain 
his exact position in respect to this matter. 

Mr. Hardy. I have been in business for myself, in Boston, some thirty- 
three years. During that time I have always refused to let any building for 
the sale of intoxicating liquors. I am one of three trustees of an estate that 
purchased the Tremont House at auction. We leased the building for hotel 
purposes, putting the lessee under an agreement to commit no nuisance, nor 
transact any illegal business. More than that I had no right to demand, 
and was not called upon to do more. I understand that the reverend gentle- 
man before me, (Dr. Miner,) from his pulpit, and the gentleman upon his left, 
(Mr. Spooner,) in an adjoining hall, and sundry other gentlemen in the Com- 
monwealth, have stated what is simply untrue : that I owned that building, 
and received an income of $15,000 per year therefrom. If I am wrong, I 
beg to be corrected. 

Mr. Miner. So far as I am concerned, the statement is totally wrong. 

Mr. Spooner. The only statement that I have made is, that Mr. Hardy 
was one of the trustees of the Sears estate that owned the Tremont House ; 
that it was let for a hotel, and that a grog-shop was kept in it. I never inti- 
mated that Mr. Hardy had any personal interest in the matter. I was very 
careful upon that subject. 

Mr. Hardy. I wish still further to state, that I have no pecuniary interest 
in the property. My compensation, as chairman of the trustees of the estate, 
does not depend at all upon the Tremont House, but would remain the same 
if the house were sold. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Are you the chief administrator upon that estate ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Do the other gentlemen, acting as trustees, receive the same compensa- 
tion as yourself? 

A. That is a business matter. If you will come into my office I will 
explain it. 

Q. You rely upon the provisions of your lease, that the place should be 
used in accordance with the laws of the State ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you feel that in that lease you had 

Mr. Andrew. I object to this question. It does not interest the Com- 
monwealth of Massachusetts to know how a man feels. The question before 
us is, What shall the legislature of Massachusetts do in respect to a system of 
legislation of great importance ? I have the utmost respect and personal 
regard for, and confidence in Mr. Hardy. I think it was but just in the 



204 APPENDIX. 

Committee to give him an opportunity to make an explanation, which he was 
goaded into making by the unjust aspersions — of whom, I will not say. The 
explanation has been offered, and a disavowal made on the other side. 
Beyond that, the public have no concern, and I object to our being farther 
delayed by questions relating to mere business matters. 

Mr. Miner. The chief point of interest here, is the point of feeling, 
of conviction. Gentlemen are called here in grand array, to say what they 
think, and how they feel, and what they hope for, under some as yet undefined 
law. It is a matter of some importance, in order to judge of the value of 
opinions, and feelings, to know precisely the stand-point and principles of 
action of the gentlemen who thus testify. I do by no means impugn the 
motives of anybody. I ask no questions that are not believed to have the 
effect of exhibiting the surroundings, and presenting a proper back-ground, 
on which may fall the light of their opinion that the picture presented, may 
be clear, open and frank. The question I desired to ask was, whether it was 
his belief, in leasing the property, that it would not be used in the sale 
of intoxicating liquors ? If the question is deemed improper, I do not desire 
to urge it. 

Mr. Aldrich. The Committee think that Mr. Hardy has stated frankly 
and fully his relation to this matter ; that the exact position he holds is now 
known, and that to go into an examination of his feelings on the subject, 
would be hardly profitable nor proper. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Much stress has been laid upon the taking of 
liquors home, and their secret sale and use. If I understand you, under the 
license law that you suggest, all the liquor that old topers have shall be 
taken to their homes ? 

A. I said nothing of the kind. 

Q. You said that you would suppress open bars everywhere ? 

A. I would. 

Q. How then would you do ? 

A. I would let people go without. If you went to a hotel, you might 
drink a glass of wine, or a bottle of wine, if you pleased. 

Q. You would not have liquor served to citizens, but only to guests ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think that it is the business of a hotel to keep a bar. 

Q. Then, so far as the citizens are concerned, if they would drink, they 
must keep the liquor at their homes ? 

A. That is a private matter that I would leave them to act upon. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) You are a practical man, and, undoubtedly, like 
practical questions. I look upon this examination as a discussion between 
two classes of temperance men ; one class in favor of a prohibitory law, and 
the other in favor of a license law. We have asked several gentlemen, who 
came before the Committee, to give a definite idea of what kind of a law they 
would have, but have not been able generally to get much of an answer. The 
most of them decline to give their opinion. You have said that you would 
not have an open bar, but that you would allow hotels to sell to their guests, 
and to no one else. Would you allow eating-houses to sell liquor to persons 
to be drank upon their premises ? 

A. No, sir; I would not. 



APPENDIX. 205 

Q. Would you allow grocers to sell liquor to be drank upon their 
premises ? 

A. I have not given the subject sufficient consideration to frame a bill, 
but I shall be perfectly satisfied as a friend of temperance, (which I am, and 
know no other interest, nor represent any other interest here,) with any laAv, 
and will aid in enforcing any law, which this honorable Committee, after 
having heard all the evidence on the subject, shall give us. 

Q. You said you would not license eating-houses to furnish liquor to be 
drank on the premises, and yet you hesitate to say that you would not allow 
grocers thus to sell ? 

A. No, I do not hesitate to say that. I do not know how far I would 
be willing to carry that point. I should want the licenses to be very few and 
very carefully guarded, — as carefully as it is possible for human wisdom to 
guard them. I should also want the law to accord with public sentiment, so 
that you could have with the law the public sentiment to execute it. 

Testimony of E. Haskett Derby. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You have been a temperance man for a great 
many years ? 

A . For forty years. 

Q. Have you ever been a traveller abroad ? 

A. I have been twice to Europe. 

Q. How long a time did you spend abroad ? 

A. On the first occasion, a brief period of sixty days; upon the second, 
rather more than four months. 

Q. When were you last in Europe V 

A. In the early part of 1864. 

Q. Did you have any occasion to observe the habits of the people of 
European countries — in vine-growing and wine-drinking regions — in respect 
to temperance or intemperance ? If so, I wish you would be kind enough to 
state what you have observed, and the results at which you have arrived, as 
briefly as possible, and in your own way ? 

A. My first visit to Europe was in 1843. On that occasion I landed in 
England, and after remaining for a short time in London, crossed to Paris. 
We landed at Dieppe in the morning, and, in company with a friend, took 
our breakfast. The first sight that greeted my eyes was a party of French 
people — a gentleman, his wife and children, some lads of twelve or fifteen, 
and some young ladies — taking their breakfast. We called for coffee, rolls, 
and butter. The French family were breakfasting on claret and bread and 
butter, using claret instead of coffee. The French drink claret as we drink 
coffee, and I observed that they were as healthy in appearance as other people. 
That was the first intimation I had of French custom and French manners. 
This custom was something new to me, and attracted my attention ; but I 
afterwards found, in travelling through France, that claret was there used as 
we use water. 

Q. Give your observation of the apparent effect, if any, of this habit of 
drinking wine, as a beverage, upon the morality of the people ? 



206 APPENDIX. 

A. During both of my visits to Europe — and I passed into Italy on my 
second visit — I do not remember to have seen a single case of intoxication. 
I certainly saw more intoxication in one month after my return than I did 
during the six months of my absence in Europe. 

Q. After your return to Boston ? 

A. After my return to Boston. 

Q. How extensively did this habit prevail among the people of common 
means and simple manners — the habit of using wine as a daily beverage, and 
with their food '? 

A. In passing through the streets of Paris, I noticed little shops where the 
wine was sold. I found that it was the common beverage of the people, and 
that it could be obtained at a cost of three or four cents per tumbler-full. 

Q. Did you go into Italy ? 

A. I went to Italy, and observed the same thing there. In dining there — 
at a hotel in Italy — a piece of bread is placed beside your plate, and a bottle 
of claret. The claret is quite as common as the bread. I found this the 
case at Nice, at Naples, at Rome, and at Florence. No extra charge is made 
for it. Perhaps the \\-ine is not always the best the country affords ; if you 
want better, you can call for it. I remember once meeting an intelligent 
laborer in the neighborhood of Milan, who was conversant with several lan- 
guages, and I asked him what his wages were. He said they were a sum 
equivalent to eighty cents per day. I asked him why he did not go to 
America. I told him that his ability to speak several languages would secure 
him a position where he could get six or eight hundred dollars per year. He 
asked me if he could get his wine. I inquired why he wanted wine. He 
said that he could not dispense with the light wine of his country ; that he 
could dispense with meat much better than with wine. I think that the use of 
light wines is habitual. I remember crossing the Mediterranean Sea, to 
Corsica and Elba, in the month of January. The weather was cold, and 
there were no fires in the cabin. Breakfast was served at ten o'clock, and it 
seemed to me rather an inhospitable breakfast, with neither coffee nor tea, 
but there was plenty of claret on the table, and was the only beverage 
given us. 

Q. What is the effect of this habitual use of wine on the people of Italy, 
as respects intemperance, when compared with the results of liquor-drinking, 
as you have observed them, on the people of the United States ? 

A. I saw no such effects. You see more in one visit to our police court, 
of the effects of liquor, than you can see in all Europe, according to my 
experience. 

Q. Passing from that topic, have you had any occasion to study and 
investigate the effect produced upon the consumption of spirituous liquors by 
prohibition, or by restricting its sale by taxation ? 

A. Yes, sir. I was requested by the Secretary of the Treasury to aid the 
Revenue Commission in investigating two or three questions, — one was in 
respect to cotton, and another in respect to spirits. I studied both subjects. 
I came to the conclusion that a tax of two dollars per gallon on spirituous 
liquors was nearly equivalent to a prohibition of its sale ; that it prohibited, 
to a very great extent, the manufacture of the article, and that it destroyed 



APPENDIX. 207 

the revenue of the country. The Revenue Commission, who at first were in 
favor of the tax, after listening to the argument that I submitted, came to the 
conclusion that the tax of two dollars per gallon should not be enforced, and 
have since endeavored to satisfy Congress that that tax was a mistake. 

Q. Although the tax seems adapted to produce a prohibition, what is the 
effect actually produced ? 

A . The effect of such a tax, in the first place, is to destroy the use of 
spirituous liquors in the arts, which is a matter of interest to all. More than 
one-half of the alcohol manufactured was used in the arts. It was used as a 
burning fluid to a considerable extent. It was used in the manufacture of 
various articles. Its use in the arts has been almost prohibited. I think that 
the tax of two dollars per gallon has caused a loss to the revenue of the 
country of from two to three hundred millions of dollars. 

Q. I will not inquire into the effect produced upon the revenue of the 
United States, but of the effect of legislation amounting, in its tendency, to 
a prohibition. What has experience proved in respect to the actual reduc- 
tion of its consumption in the country V The revenue returns will show one 
thing in regard to the United States Treasury ; what do the facts of history 
show in regard to the actual production and consumption ? 

Mr. Jewell. That is to say, does this prohibitory duty decrease the 
manufacture ? 

A. For the purposes of drinking, it has not reduced the manufacture. It 
has, however, reduced the purity of the article. I believe that as much, or 
more, is drank to-day than was consumed in 1859. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Are there any statistics that will show the pro- 
duction of contraband liquors ? 

A. Nothing definite. That is done secretly in cellars, &c. The only 
thing that shows it is the increase in the business of the coppersmiths. They 
are unwilling to tell to whom they sell, but there is a wonderful increase in 
their business throughout the country. 

Q. Have you observed any estimate, either made by the Internal Revenue 
Department, or by the Committee of Ways and Means, of the actual pro- 
duction of whiskey for the purposes of beverage, during the last year ? 

A. I do not think that I have seen the more recent estimate. The last 
estimate I noticed was somewhere from forty to fifty millions of gallons 
for beverages. On the return for duty, the amount is only fourteen or fifteen 
millions of gallons, in place of the ninety-two or ninety-three millions 
returned in 1859. 

Q. Did you observe the recent speech of the Chairman of the Committee 
of Ways and Means, in the House of Representatives, in which he states the 
fact that the revenue derived from the tax of two dollars per gallon had been 
but twenty-nine millions of dollars, whereas, if there had been an honest 
return, it would have yielded a revenue of ninety millions of dollars ? 

A. I saw his statement, and have no doubt that it is correct. 

Q. Therefore, has the effect been other than this : to drive honest distillers 
out of the market, and to place the business in the hands of dishonest men, 
who carry it on in a contraband way ? 

A. That has been the effect. 



208 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you perceive any real difference between the effect of a law pro- 
hibiting the sale of liquor, and the effect of a law practically prohibiting its 
production ? 

A. The effect is the same. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do I understand you to say that you saw no 
drunkenness in Italy ? 

A. I do not remember a single case. 

Q. Did your travels at any time lead you to think of the subject of intem- 
perance while in the suburbs of any of the large cities such as Paris, Lyons, 
Marseilles ? 

A. Yes, sir, in Paris ; and should have noticed it if it had been common. 
I noticed the appearance of general health, — an appearance as if they did 
not drink at all. I did not see the pallid faces that I see at home. 

Q. Do you think that there is any analogy between the climates of those 
countries, and our own severer climate ? Is it possible to conduct our social 
regulations upon such principles as would be desirable were our climate like 
theirs ? 

Q. I think that the climate of the north of France is not dissimilar to 
that of Rhode Island, Connecticut, and portions of Massachusetts. The cli- 
mate may be, perhaps, a little milder. I see no difficulty in that respect. 

Q. Do you deem it practicable, to ripen the grape in New England ? 

A. I do. I have seen wine made from New England grapes. I think 
that in this country, in time, we shall have an abundance of wine. I think it 
will be a great blessing when it comes. My remedy for drunkenness would 
be the introduction of those light wines. In Norway they have cured intem- 
perance by introducing the light wines of France. 

Q. Has the attempt to introduce wine into Scotland ever been made ? 

A. I have seen it stated that in ancient times claret was used as a bever- 
age in Scotland, and that they were more temperate then than now. 

Q. Do you rest that statement upon any well verified statistics, or upon 
general facts ? 

A. I learn it from the books of travellers. In regard to Norway, we have 
the testimony of Sir Morton Peto. He recommends the introduction of claret 
wine as a cure for intemperance. 

Q. Your position, then, touching prohibition, is, that it is impracticable? 

A. I think it impossible as well as impracticable. 

Q. You do not mean that the prohibition of the open sale of liquor is 
impossible or impracticable ? 

A. I do not mean that ; I mean that it is impossible to prevent the sale. 

Q. Do you think that the manufacture and the sale would be as great 
under a prohibition as under an open sale ? 

A. I fear that it would be larger. It was larger in London under a pro- 
hibitive law than it ever was before or since. 

Q. Did liquor-dealers there desire a change in the law that would restrict 
the manufacture ? 

A. I have an extract from a book which I will read, and will give a better 
answer to your question than anything I can say : — 



APPENDIX. 209 

"In 1737 a duty equal to $1.84 per gallon was imposed on spirits, in Great 
Britain, and the sale of all quantities less than two gallons was interdicted. 
A fine of £100 was also imposed on all who violated the law by a sale of 
spirit. ' Respectable dealers withdrew from the trade proscribed by Parli- 
ament, and the business fell into the hands of the lowest and most profligate 
characters. The people espoused the cause of the smugglers, and informers 
were hunted down like wild animals, officers of the revenue were assailed in 
the streets, and drunkenness, disorder and crime increased with frightful 
rapidity.' In two years twelve thousand people were arrested in London for 
offences against the law. But neither revenue officers nor magistrates could 
stop the torrent of smuggling. Seven millions of gallons were annually sold 
in London, and its environs alone, as much as paid duty in all England 
before the adoption of the law. After two years' struggle the Government 
gave up the contest, and repealed the law. A check was instantly given 
to smuggling, and if the vice of drunkenness was not materially diminished, 
it has never been stated that it was increased." 

This is from " McCulloch, on Taxation." 

Q. I do not discover an answer to my question, which is, whether the liquor 
manufacturers and traffickers of London, during that period when their sales 
were greatest, asked a change of the law that would restrict them ? 

A. I understand that a change was demanded by the community, including 
them. 

Q. But this law produced smuggling. Smuggling, of course, would restrict 
home manufacture ? 

A. " The people," is the expression, — the whole community, — "espoused 
the cause of the smugglers." 

Q. The question is, whether the liquor manufacturers and dealers of 
London asked a change that would restrict their own business ? 

A. I do not know anything further about that than what I have read. 

Q. If it is proper, I would like to ask youtiiis practical question, touching 
our own home affairs : Why, if the demand and manufacture of liquor is 
likely to be greater under a suppression of open sale, our manufacturers and 
dealers ask a change in the law, — why do they ask a license law that shall be 
stringently restrictive ? 

A. I am unable to answer that question, as I have never conferred with 
the liquor-dealers. 

Q. Are you not aware that they are among the petitioners ? 

A. I have not read the names attached to any of the petitions. 

Q. What would you recommend in place of the existing law ? 

A. In the first place, I would recommend a repeal of the duty upon the 
light wines of France. I would recommend encouragement of the growth of 
the grape, so that every man should live " under his own vine and fig tree." 
We have undertaken to get rid of the destruction that wasteth at noon-day. 
I claim to be somewhat of a temperance man, and would put down intemper- 
ance if I could do it judiciously; but I believe that the destruction that 
wasteth at noon-day is a pestilence that walketh in darkness. We have driven 
liquor into the holes and the cellars. The illicit distiller confederates with 
the illicit seller. I would bring the whole traffic out into the daylight. I 
27 



210 APPENDIX. 

would license the sale of spirits. I would deal with it as with one of the 
elements. A question has been asked about children. We put a curb around 
a well to keep children out of it, but we do not deny them the use of the 
water because a child might drown in the well. We put a fender around the 
fire to keep a child out of it, but do not deny it the warmth. 

Q. Then you would give a child liquor as a beverage ? 

A. No, sir. I would have a fender. 

Q. That is, prohibition ? 

A. No, sir; not prohibition. If I thought it desirable that the child 
should have more warmth he should have it under my aid and guidance. I 
assume that every man has the right to regulate his own diet, but I would try 
to guide the appetite and to correct the taste. When you deal with the man 
who sells liquor, you do not effect the desire, the appetite for drink, nor cor- 
rect the taste. If you punish one man for selling, you do not get rid of the 
appetite. The purchaser can go to another seller to gratify his appetite. I 
would correct the taste. 

Q. Allow me to ask if that manner of reasoning does not involve the 
necessary nurture of the appetite by moderate drinking, and if your license 
law restrains a seller from selling to a man whose appetite has become strong 
would he not turn to some secret place to purchase ? 

A. I think not. I would have a license law and I would also have an 
inspector of liquors. The claret, the light wines, the brandy sold should be 
perfectly pure. A man would then not go to secret places to obtain his 
liquor, because he would find poison there. I consider the liquors now sold 
as poisonous. Let me give you an instance. A friend of mine sometime 
since brought a suit, and attached a stock of liquor. The party upon the 
other side, moved that the liquor be sold at auction. Objection was made to 
the immediate sale, because the liquor would improve by keeping. The 
other parties said that the liquor was impure and would spoil in six months 
and therefore had better be sold^ at once. In secret places I should expect 
to get that kind of an article but under a proper inspection and in public 
places I should expect to get a pure article. 

Q. Are you aware whether or not there arc any laws respecting the 
purity of liquor and requiring an inspection ? 

A. I believe there are such laws but the matter is neglected. 

Q. Why do not temperance men move in that matter ? 

A. I think it is time that they did. 

Q. You are one of them ? 

A . But I have not taken an active part in the campaign, I have had 
other duties to perform. 

Q. I will ask you this question, whether the character of the business of 
which you have just spoken would be made either more or less respectable by 
a law that should protect the seller in a traffic for the public good ? 

A. I think it would be made more respectable, and that is what I wish. 
If liquor is to be sold I would have it sold by people of responsibility. 

Q. Would the patronage of such places be more respectable than now ? 



APPENDIX. 211 

A. I do not know sir. You now virtually say to a man that lie shall not 
drink. The law prohibits the sale. If no one can legally sell, then the man 
who buys is in complicity with the man who sells, in a violation of the law. 

Q. Do I understand you then to say that licensing the traffic would 
probably make it more respectable ? 

A. I think it would tend to. 

Q. But would making the trafficking and the use of liquor more respectable 
tend to diminish the traffic and use ? 

A. To some extent I think it would, for when you say to a man that he 
shall not have a particular thing, he naturally says he will have it. 

Q. Very well then, granting that when you say to a man that he shall 
not have liquor he naturally says that he will have it, so when you say to a 
man, " You shall not commit adultery," he says, " I will," would you therefore 
abolish the law against adultery ? 

A. Oh, no. In the first case it is the mere saying so, that makes the 
drinking an offence. Adultery is a very different offence. 

Q. Do you not recognize a habit, the evils of which are so widely preva- 
lent and so universally felt, as an offence against good order ? 

A. The misery and evils resulting from the habit are not I think in con- 
sequence of the use of liquor, but from the use of adulterated liquor. 

Q. How long has this practice of adulterating liquors been in vogue ? 

A. Ever since the days of Addison, two centuries ago, and I do not know 
how much earlier. 

Q. Do you think that there was any less drunkenness, comparatively, in 
Addison's time than now ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. There is an excise or license law in New York, I believe ? 

A. There is. 

Q. Is the quality of liquors better in New York than in Massachusetts ? 

A. I am not able to tell that. 

Q. Do you suspect or believe that it is ? 

A . I think it is. 

Q. Why do you think so ? 

A. I think so from conversations that I have had with friends : although I 
think, that under the present tax of two dollars per gallon, very little pure 
liquor is to be found in the country. We had before the Revenue Commis- 
sion a chemist who estimated that the liquor now sold was five parts pure and 
twenty parts impure. 

Q. I understand why you would use a fender to keep your child out of 
the fire, and I understand why you would not allow the liquor-seller to sell to 
him. Would you give liquor to your child yourself? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then I do not understand your illustration of the fender which permits 
him to receive some of the warmth, at the same time keeping the child out of 
the fire ? 

A. It was in reply to a question asked of another witness that I used that 
illustration. My idea was that I would deal with spirits as I would with the 
element of fire, which does great mischief when unguarded. I might, perhaps, 



212 APPENDIX. 

let my cldld burn his fingers a little, to teach him that he ought not to go into 
it ; but I would guard against his falling into the fire. 

Q. That is, you would not give your child any liquor as a beverage ? 

A . I think not. 

Q. Why not, if it is a good ? 

A. I have not said that it was a good. I do believe, however, that there 
are certain parties who require it. I believe that a little claret wine or ale? 
in certain conditions of the system, promotes health. 

Q. Are those conditions such as to make wine or ale strictly medicinal ? 

A. Not strictly medicinal, — alimentary. 

Q. As food ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is alcohol, in any preparation, food for the human system ? 

A. I believe that the light wines, as used in Europe, are to a great extent 
a substitute for food. I believe that the quantity of wine used in France 
averages nearly a bottle per day for every inhabitant. 

Q. Do your New York friends have any difficulty in finding satisfactory 
liquor in Boston ? 

A. That I am unable to say. 

Q. You have no definite data, then, upon which to stand in saying that 
the liquors sold in New York are better than those sold in Boston — nothing 
more than the general suggestions of friends ? 

A. My friends, when they want a good, pure article of wine, are apt to 
send to New York for it. 

Q. Is there not a great deal more liquor sold as wine in this country than 
is really imported into the country ? 

A. Yes, sir ; there is a great manufactory of champagne in New Jersey. I 
understand that the principal part of it is manufactured in New Jersey. 

Q. Is there any pure wine imported into this country ? 

A. I have no doubt that there is. Claret is furnished in Europe at a cost 
from three to five cents per bottle, and a great deal of it is imported here in 
bottles. 

Q. Is there any wine imported into this country that has not undergone 
enforcement ? 

A. I believe they do put alcohol in the lowest grades of wine to enable 
them to bear the voyage. 

Q. Is not that almost universally true of imported wine ? 

A. I have not been in the trade, but I have heard it remarked that such 
wine required a little enforcement to cross the ocean. I believe that in claret 
wine there is only about 8 per cent, of alcohol. It is about the strength of 
cider ; perhaps hardly so strong. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you consider that the use of those light wines 
has a tendency to create an appetite for stronger drinks ? 

A. No, sir, but the contrary. In France there are one hundred gallons of 
wine sold to one of brandy or spirits, and that one is used principally in the 
arts. I think, in drinking, the ratio is two hundred of wine to one of brandy. 



APPENDIX. 213 

Q. You spoke of the prohibition of the sale as not removing the appetite 
for liquor. Is it not true that no criminal law removes the occasion of trans- 
gression — the temptation ? 

A. I have not reflected sufficiently to answer that question satisfactorily 
to myself. 

I was asked the question what kind of a law I would have. My idea is to 
have a license law ; to have a heavy charge, perhaps of one or two hundred 
dollars for a license, and an equal or greater sum deposited to be forfeited in 
case of improper conduct on the part of the party licensed, to be forfeited, for 
instance, if his liquors were adulterated. I would have a public inspector of 
liquors. In regard to the country my idea is, that if there is any town or 
seetion of the country, where they have arrived at a sufficient degree of 
advancement or refinement to dispense with the sale of liquor entirely, I 
would let that town or section of the country decide for itself the question 
of sale. 

Q. Do you remember when the license laws were in operation in the 
Commonwealth ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Do you remember the time when there were not as many unlicensed 
places of sale as licensed ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Have you a distinct knowledge or recollection upon that subject ? 

A. I have only a general recollection. I think that licensing tends to 
restrain the unlicensed places. That is my judgment from observation. 

Q. You spoke of a heavy charge for licensing ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you consider the sum you have named as sufficient to restrain or 
restrict the business of large dealers ? 

A. Perhaps the license should be proportionate to the magnitude of the 
sales. 

Q. TVould not the question you have raised, as to whether a party was in 
a proper condition to be a purchaser, be far more difficult to resolve than the 
question involved in the present form of the law ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. "Would you not be compelled to let a party go on until he had become 
inebriated, before you could punish the seller ? 

A. I think not ; I think it would be much more easy to procure a con- 
viction than it is at present. 

Q. You spoke of the right of towns to suppress it according to their 
pleasure. That is clearly shifting the principle of the enactment of criminal 
laws, and changes the theory of our Commonwealth ? 

A. Then I would change it. 

Q. I ask you why a thousand citizens of Boston, who have children 
that they wish to rear in good habits, have not the right to protest against the 
open sale of liquor, and its seductive influences, as presented under the old 
license law ? 

A. I think a license law would give the best protection. 

Q. Then why not enforce it upon the country at large ? 



214 APPENDIX. 

A. My idea is to leave it to the communities to decide the question accord- 
ing to their best judgment. I can conceive of a community where the people 
would vote with great unanimity to have no sale. Where they were so unan- 
imous upon the subject, I would let them do as they pleased. 

Q. Do you not think that in a large city, especially in one having a grow- 
ing foreign element, that the principle you enunciate here would be exceed- 
ingly unfair in its operation, in making the whole American population subject 
to the vote of the foreign element, in so great a matter as the use of liquor and 
its consequences ? 

A. My idea upon that subject is that in the large towns and in large 
cities, you would always be obliged to have a license law ; for in large towns 
we cannot attain that degree of perfection that is possible in some of the 
quiet valleys of the interior. 

Q. Does not the very implication of your answer, that we have not arrived 
at that degree of perfection, tend to introduce machinery that would debar 
our journeying that way ? 

A. No, sir ; but I think the present law does. 

Q. Do you not think it would be exceedingly unfair, in the case of two 
adjoining towns, where one wished to prohibit the sale of liquor and the other 
did not, for those who desired to suppress the sale ? Would not the one be 
subject to the action of the other ? 

A. To a very limited extent. Parties would not travel from one city to 
another to get a glass of liquor. 

Q. Through what difficulties would not the lover of liquor go to get his 
dram ? 

A. I do not think it would have a very pernicious effect. 

Q. Charlestown and Boston are adjacent to each other 

A. I apprehend that in Charlestown, Boston, Boxbury, and in those large 
cities, the license law is the best remedy against intemperance and vice. 

Q. Are you sure that there has been an increase of drunkenness in Boston 
during the last twenty years, considering the increase in population ? 

A. It is much greater in proportion to the number of inhabitants. 

Q. I think it is difficult to show that. 

A. I take it from the police record. 

Testimony of John C. Cluer. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What is your present position ? 
| A . I am a police officer, at present. 

Q. What are your peculiar duties in relation to the police ? 

A. My peculiar duties are to look after cases of intemperance. Every 
morning I report first at the office and then go into the Tombs. I take the 
name of every prisoner, the number of the cell in which he is confined, his age, 
the charge against him, the name of the officer who arrested him, and the 
station with which the officer is connected. I then go to the .cells and speak 
to the party confined, and ask him generally these questions : Where do you 
live? What is your trade ? Are you married? How many children have 
you? How did you happen to get here? Of course, a very large propor- 
tion of the parties who are confined, are confined for being drunk. I have 



APPENDIX. 215 

here a report of the cases of intemperance occuring within seven days, which 
I made out some three weeks ago, when I was about delivering a lecture on 
intemperance. [Produces report.] Here are the answers to the questions 
that I ask, for I write all the time that I am asking. 

Q. How recent were those seven days ? 

A. From January 20th to the 28th, taking the Sundays out. After I have 
asked them all these questions and learned all that I can from the prisoners, 
I then go up stairs and sit down, and I keep the record of every case that 
comes up. There are many cases that I think that it is best to take bail for, 
and put them on probation. I ask the judges to lessen their fines and give 
them moral advice. I keep a record in my book of all the parties I become 
bail for. After all the prisoners have been tried in the morning, their friends 
come into my office in the Tombs, and I make such arrangements for the wel- 
fare of the prisoners as I have power to do. I attend court again in the after- 
noon. At night I visit such of the homes of the prisoners as I have selected 
and made a note of during the day, to see their families. I talk with the men 
and women. I advise them to leave off the drinking of intoxicating liquors, 
and urge them to sign the pledge. I seldom go home before eleven o'clock at 
night, frequently not until twelve o'clock. That is my usual round of duty. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Is this duty imposed upon you as a police 
officer ? 

A. It is a part of my special duty. I was appointed under the administra- 
tion of Mayor Lincoln, and since Col. Kurtz has been Chief. In consequence 
of statements made by Mr. Miner and Mr. Spooner, I received instructions to 
ask of prisoners who were put in for drunkenness, whether they would 
tell where they got their liquor. Every morning I ask that question. 
I have here [producing paper] a list of the prisoners of whom I have asked 
that question — a list containing some thousands of names. I have frequently 
been insulted on my asking that question. The prisoners feel that they are 
outraged when asked to tell where they purchased their liquor. With two 
exceptions, all that I have inquired of refused to tell where they got their 
liquor- One purchased his rum at what is called the u Horse Shoe," where, 
for five cents, they take a glass and go and brew their own rum — an 
article, as has been said, that " kills around a corner." That man was so 
stupid, that, by the time I got him up stairs, I could not get the statement out 
of him. The other one backed out from telling before I could get him into 
the dock. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What do you find to be the condition of the 
families that you have visited, as regards intemperance ? 

A. I will state a fact that will answer that question. At night, as people 
are going out of some place of amusement, I frequently make it my duty to 
follow some ragged children home. I select three or four, who appear to be 
in company, and follow them to their homes, and I generally find that both 
parents and children are drunkards. 

Q. How extensive is the drunkenness of the children ? 

A. Very extensive. One day, after making my tour among the prisoners 
who had been arrested for drunkenness, police officer Perry called my atten- 
tion to some little girls that he said were starving, and whose parents were 



216 APPENDIX. 

drunkards. I visited their home. Their statement was, that two of them 
had slept in an alley-way, and the other under a sink. On entering a room, 
I found their father sitting stupid drunk, a bottle, that had contained liquor, 
broken and lying on the floor, and another containing New England rum. 
There was another man lying in the corner, so drunk that I was unable to 
remove him. I then went with two other little girls into a room in Adams 
Street, and found both the father and mother of one of them stupid drunk, 
and the mother of the other little girl stupid drunk. In obedience to the 
instructions given me by the Chief of Police, I complained in the Police 
Court of the man who kept the rum-shop just at the entrance of the place 
where these cases were found, but I was never even summoned as a witness 
in the case. How it was settled, I never knew. I made a complaint, a 
warrant was granted, and the man came into court. 

Q. How old were those girls ? 

A. The eldest, I think, was thirteen, and the youngest twelve. 

Q. State what you know, from your own observation, as to the secret sale 
and use of liquor ? 

A. I know a house of ten rooms in this city, and every room is a rum- 
shop. I know another tenement, where, in a room of twelve feet square, 
thirteen people live, and they are all drunkards, and keep rum in the place. 
I know of another place where there are fourteen persons in a room of the 
same size ; a part are drunkards, and a part are not. I know of two blocks 
in this city where there are sixty-four families, and where, I do not believe, 
any person here could live and not become a drunkard. Such is the physical 
condition of the place, that I conceive it to be utterly impossible for any 
human being to breathe the pestiferous air and be a sober, decent man. And 
that block is owned by a member of Congress from Massachusetts. 

Q. Have you noticed as to the manner in which liquor is conveyed into 
those houses ? 

A . Stills, sir, are as common in Boston as tea-kettles are getting to be in 
a certain class. Any one that has ever studied the subject, knows that an old 
kettle, with a piece of broken gas-pipe, makes a capital still, and will make 
as much rum in six hours as will make a whole neighborhood drunk. 

Q. When those places are closed, I want to inquire what devices arc 
resorted to by the people to obtain liquor and to get it into their houses ? 

A. Some of them make it. Some get it by various devices. Some of them, 
like a great many temperance people, are troubled with fits of sickness and get 
it from the agents, but generally they get it from other liquor-dealers. They 
are all clubbed together. 

Q. During what period of the twenty-four hours is liquor carried into the 
houses ? 

A. Daring the night, generally. 

Q. Is it generally understood among those people that when the liquor is 
got into the dwelling-houses that it is not subject to seizure ? 

A. They understand that perfectly well. In a case that I recently prose- 
cuted, the owner of the place had a large quantity stowed away in his house, 
and knew very well that it could not be touched. 
. Q. How extensively is that device now resorted to ? 



APPENDIX. 217 

A . My impression is, that it is very extensively indeed. There is hardly 
a street in Boston where the poorer classes live, that I do not visit every week, 
and frequently a great many times in a week. I average five visits every 
night, to places of this kind. 

Q. Has that device of carrying liquor at night into the dwelling-houses, 
increased since there has been more shutting up of the shops ? 

A. There was very little of it previous to the closing of the shops. It has 
grown up since then, entirely, so far as my knowledge of the matter goes ? 

Q. You had the same means of knowing previous to the closing of the 
shops that you have now ? 

A. Certainly, I had. Before I became an officer at all, it was my prac- 
tice to learn all that I could upon this subject. 

Q. Do you know as a matter of fact that this way of carrying liquor into 
the dwelling-houses, did not exist until since they began to shut up the shops ? 

A . I cannot now recall, within the seven years previous, half a dozen 
cases. 

Q. Are they now very numerous ? 

Q. Very common, indeed. Gentlemen, — temperance men, — have gone 
with me between eleven and twelve o'clock at night, to see this state of facts. 

Q. How long have you been a tetotaller ? 

A. I have not taken a glass of any kind of intoxicating liquor for thirty- 
three years. I have never taken liquor but twice during that time. Once I 
took two teaspoonsful of brandy, and another time half a glass of whiskey, and 
and I was so disgusted with the thing that I fired the bottle out of the 
window. 

Q. You have been actively engaged, I suppose, in the temperance 
cause ? 

A. I have taken such steps as I thought would promote the cause of tem- 
perance, ever since I signed the pledge. 

Q. I will ask you what change, if any, of the present law, you deem advis- 
able ? Do you think it possible, as things are, to execute the present law ? 
Can you shut up the shops? and can you thereby check and prevent 
drunkenness ? 

A. It is only a matter of justice to myself, that I be allowed to say in 
answer to one other question that ought to be put to me, that I have 
always, until four years ago, been in favor of a prohibitory liquor law, and 
never in favor of a license law. I have never been in favor of the present 
law for the reasons I stated a few minutes ago. From observing such facts as 
come under my notice ; from witnessing such misery, constantly and hourly 
increasing, notwithstanding my feelings are all in that direction, my judgment 
says that it would be better to alter the present law. 

Q. As far as you have had opportunity for observation, do you think that 
if the action of the authorities should be pursued ten times as rigorously as 
now, it would check the consumption of liquor by these people ? 

A. I think it would not, for this reason : They conceive the law to be a 
persecution ; their judgment has • not yet been convinced ; they think they 
have a right to drink, and that any attempt to prevent their drinking, is med- 
dling with their rights. 
28 



218 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. SpOONER.) How long have you been in tne cit y ? 

A . Over twenty years. 

Q. How long have you been employed in the (% government ? 

A. Two years, last June. 

Q. You were in the habit of preaching tempei ance a g ood deal > J believe, 
before you got into the city employ ? 

A. I never preached temperance ; I lectured o n 1<; > an( * practised it. 

Q. You lectured on temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you ever use any violent words against tlie cit y government before 
you were in its employ ? 

A. Repeatedly, but not against this city government. We have had a 
reform worthy the excellent man that has been a* tne bead °^ ** & r tne * ast 
few years. Things are now in a different conc iitIon from wliat they w ere 
when I exposed them. 

Q. (By Mr. Avery.) You spoke of the ch! 1(lren in certain localities 
being in the habit of using intoxicating liquors anc* becoming drunk. Do your 
observations lead you to the conclusion that this intemperance among children 
is the result of the secret use of liquor in families induced by the attempt to 
suppress the open sale ? 

A. I think it is. I would add that, in nry opi nIon > famI1 7 drinking is one 
great cause of intemperance. I should like to sa y something about wine. 
All our churches use intoxicating wine. Last ni<5 nt ■* analyzed some of the 
" wine " used in the Orthodox churches, and I fou nd but 14 per cent, of wine 
in it. 

(Mr. Miner.) Mr. Cluer is now testifying o f something that he knows 
very little about. 

(Mr. Cluer.) Here is the wine— (producing a bottle of wine.) I do not 
say that such wine is used in all the Universalist c wurcn es ; but I would like to 
test some of the wine used in your church. 

Testimony of Theodore V< )elckers * 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Boston. 

Q. What is your business ? 

A. I am an architect. 

Q. Have you given your attention to the subj< 3ct of intemperance, and to 
the condition of the poorer classes in relation to intemperance . 

A. I have, sir. Unfortunately, I have, myself? nad a very large experi- 
ence in drinking, but, thanks to God, since fourye ars ago, I have been a sober 
man, and since then I have made it a study how tP benefit my fellow-men. 

Q. Will you state what you have observed of tlj e extent of the misery in 
Boston caused by the use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. It is a fact too well known to need any elucidation on my part. 
Drinking is so extensive, and has been, since I ha ve been a resident of Bos- 
ton, (twenty years,) that I have often wondered w^ere it would end. 



APPENDIX. 219 

Q. Will you state what you know in regard to the intemperate habits of 
the poorer classes ; — how they get their liquor, and how they are affected 
by it? 

A. I know nothing of their ways of obtaining liquor, but I know how I 
used to obtain it. On one occasion, when I was refused liquor in a bar-room, 
I obtained it at the State Agency, and I got drunk on that liquor. I know 
that others do the same thing now, out in the country towns. 

Q. What is your opinion, based upon your own observation and experience, 
of the value of the prohibitory liquor law ? 

A. I attempted, some days ago, when the Committee had a hearing, to 
reply to a question addressed to the Rev. Dr. Clark : — " Do you know of any 
one of the seventy thousand active temperance men of Massachusetts who 
desires a license law ? " — that he might refer to me as a reformed drunkard, 
and as one who desired a license law. I have desired a license law ever since 
the appetite for drink was fastened upon me. My mind has been much engaged 
upon the subject, and I have come to the conclusion that since we cannot 
prohibit the sale of liquor, we must control it for the benefit of humanity. 

Q. If I understand you, then, you believe that a license law, if properly 
framed and executed, would better promote the cause of temperance than a 
prohibitory law ? 

A. I do. 

Q. You speak from your own experience and observation upon this 
subject ? 

A. I do. 

Testimony of Thomas Gaffield. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long have you been connected with the 
city government? 

A. For nearly four years. 

Q. In what capacity ? 

A. For one year as Councilman, and am now entering on my third year as 
Alderman. 

Q. Have you had any connection with the Committee on the Police ? 

A. Last year I was a member of that committee ; this year I am chair- 
man. 

Q. Where is your place of business ? 

A. In Merchants' Row. 

Q. How long have you been there ? 

A. Since 1840, with the exception of one year. 

Q. Looking at the whole subject, the whole field, from your point of view, 
both as a citizen in business and as a member of the city government for the 
last few years, will you be kind enough to state to this Legislative Committee, 
your opinion of the value of the prohibitory liquor law, now on our statute 
books, for the purpose of suppressing drunkenness, as compared with some 
system of regulation ? 

A. I am a temperance man in practice, but I never spoke upon the subject 
of temperance until this moment. I was never present at the meeting of a 
temperance society as a member. As a temperance man, I was in favor of 



220 APPENDIX. 

the prohibitory liquor law as an experiment for the suppression of intemper- 
ance, which I look upon as one of the greatest evils of society, and as pro- 
ducing ninety-nine hundredths of all the misery and crime in the community. 
I thought that a prohibitory law was a good experiment when enacted, but I 
think that since that enactment — in 1854 — drunkenness has increased. There 
are three or four liquor shops in Merchants' Row, and I have noticed, on 
Saturday afternoons, the large number of demijohns that go into those stores 
where liquors are sold, to be filled and carried out of town for the comfort of 
the people of the neighboring towns during Sunday and the following week* 
I have thought, and think now, that there is now more drunkenness in Boston 
than there was previous to the passage of that law ; and my conviction as a 
temperance man is, that as the next experiment, a license law had better be 
tried. I am in favor of total abstinence, although I would let any man use 
liquor when ordered by his physician. I would take a glass of brandy and 
water, or of whiskey and sugar, if ordered to do so by my physician, as a 
medicine ; or I would take it from day to day, if run down in health or 
strength, if ordered so to do by a physician. If that makes me not a total 
abstinence man, then I am not one. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You do not object to the prohibitory law upon 
principle, but you object only because you think that experiment has not 
succeeded ? 

A. That is my ground. 

Q. From your knowledge of the action of the city government, and of the 
spirit that has ruled in the administration of criminal law in Boston in the 
several departments of responsibility, are you, as a citizen of Boston, of the 
opinion that the experiment of a prohibitory liquor law has been fairly tried ? 

A. I should not wish to say anything about previous years or decades of 
years ; but, from my own experience in the city government, I will say that 
the principle of temperance is now the ruling principle in the city govern- 
ment. I do not believe that any twelve men in Boston, taken though they 
may be from any circle, act more strictly in accordance with the principles of 
temperance than does the present Board of Aldermen. I make this remark 
because I am aware that an opinion exists among the members of the Legisla- 
ture and the people of the State generally, that the Board of Aldermen is a 
set of drinking men. I entered the Board of Aldermen three years ago. 
There is one committee of the Board that has arduous duties to perform ; are 
frequently detained long at their work, and occasionally take refreshments, 
but no intoxicating drinks. I know that that committee, of which I have now 
the honor to be chairman, take nothing in the way of intoxicating liquors. 
There are no drinks upon their refreshment table, but water and tea and 
coffee, and yet they work as hard as any committee in the city government. 
The 4th of July is thought to be an occasion when, if ever, liquor is to be 
used. On the last 4th of July, I was chairman of the committee of arrange- 
ments, and was told that it would be impossible to prohibit the use of strong 
drink on that occasion. I told the committee that I would not approve a bill 
that had liquor in it, and if I heard that any liquor was bought, I would 
deduct the amount from any bill before it should be paid. I had the testimony 
of all, that the rule was observed, and that nothing was drank down in the 



APPENDIX. 221 

harbor stronger than coffee, and all said that it was the best time that they 
had ever enjoyed. An Order was passed two or three years since prohibiting 
the use of liquor at all of our meetings. There were a few negative votes 
in the Common Council, but the Order was passed unanimously in the 
Board of Aldermen, and, as a rule, lived up to religiously during the year. 

Q. Was the experience of last year, in that respect, a new era ? 

A. It was the continuation of an era previously commenced. I saw it 
reported here yesterday by an ex-mayor, that liquor was formerly permitted 
by the city government to be used by committees in the form of refreshment, 
but it is not so now, and so long as I am member, or chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Accounts, it shall not be used in that way. 

Q. You are a prohibitionist, then ? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q. Are you aware, that in previous years, similar orders were passed but 
were not regarded by the administration as in practical force ? 
. A. Ir. the Know Nothing administration. 

Q. How extensive was that administration as to time ? 

A. It lasted for some time. I think that the city government in this 
respect has been improving for the last three or four years. I can only speak 
from my own observation and experience, but I think that there is now a 
temperance feeling in the whole city government. 

Q. Up to the last year, have not items for liquor in bills for refreshment, 
been paid, notwithstanding whatever orders may have been passed upon the 
subject ? 

A. They may have been on a few occasions. 

Q. Is it true that the school committee, some few years since, went down 
the harbor and used refreshments extensively ? 

A. Not that I am aware of. 

Q. Have you been a member of the school board at any time ? 

A. I was of the primary school board, until its reorganization, but have 
not been a member of the school committee since 1854. I am chairman of 
the committee upon public instruction, upon the part of the city council. At 
any entertainment of the Board of Aldermen, it would now be considered a 
breach of decorum and good manners for any gentleman to bring liquor into 
the room, even though he paid for it himself. 

Q. That is the present condition of the Board of Aldermen ? 

A, Yes, sir. 

Q. Have the Board of Aldermen of this year, of whom you say this, and 
the Board of Aldermen of last year, who sanctioned the course you have 
described, continued to select known liquor-sellers in making the list of names 
from which traverse juries should be drawn ? 

A. I do not think the name of any man was ever put upon the list because 
he was a liquor-seller. 

Q. I asked if they continued to select the names of known liquor-sellers. 
I ask a question of fact. 

A. Not that I know of. 

Q. Are you aware whether or not any such names selected within two 
years, are now in the jury list ? 



222 APPENDIX. 

A. I am not aware that there are. The jury list is made up in this way. 
No man can be a juror who is not a voter, therefore the city clerk gives each 
alderman the voting list of his ward. One alderman and four councilmen 
make up the jury list. They meet together and pick out one hundred names 
from each ward and these are put into the jury-box. When a service is made 
upon the mayor for twelve jurors he nominates two aldermen to select the 
names of twelve jurors from this list. They put their hands into the box and 
pull out the first name. It is impossible for them to know who is coming out. 

Q. But no names would come out of the box that were not put in ? 

A. Certainly not. 

Q. It is possible to know what names are put in ? 

A. I do not now recollect of the name of a single liquor-dealer being 
drawn out since I have been an alderman. I do not know as I should put 
in the name of a man that I knew sold liquor. 

Q. Do you know that the time has ever been, since the existence of the 
present law, that the members of the Board of Aldermen have not selected a 
large majority of the jurymen from men who were known to be engaged in 
the liquor traffic ? 

A. I cannot say as to that. I only speak from my own knowledge, and 
of my own ward. 

Q. You would not think it proper to select a liquor-dealer ? 

A. I never did place a liquor-dealer on the jury-list; but if Mr. Wil- 
liams or Mr. Young, or Mr. A or B or C, who are engaged in the liquor 
business, but who are excellent men, should express a wish to be on a jury, 
and put it upon the ground that, as citizens and tax-payers, they had a right 
to serve as jurors, I might put their names in. 

Q. Would you deem it improper, under a state of things in which you 
knew the city government were about to attempt to execute the law against 
liquor-dealers, to run a hazard in the selection of names that might be drawn 
as the traverse jury, by putting the names of liquor-dealers in the traverse 
jury list ? 

A. I might take the names ; I might take the hazard. I was once on a 
jury when there were several cases against liquor-sellers brought up, and we 
found bills against the parties in almost all the cases. I took particular 
notice of one man on the jury who was a liquor-seller, and I noticed that his 
hand went up with the rest. I supposed, then, that his hand went up because 
it would be thought, if he did not thus vote, it was because he was himself a 
liquor-seller. I had rather trust an honest liquor-seller than a too ultra-tem- 
perance man. I would trust a fair> honest man, no matter what his business 
might be. 

Q. Would you deem it a healthy state of things when a man was put on 
the jury who was so related or connected with the party to be tried that 
he would feel an interest in keeping his brother from conviction, because 
the next turn of the wheel might bring him in ? 

A. I might hesitate under such circumstances, on the ground that the 
man was an interested party. 



APPENDIX. 223 

Q. You spoke of the present tone of thought and feeling in the Board of 
Aldermen ; do you mean to say that the present Board are unanimously of 
that feeling, or that only a majority of them are ? 

A. The order that I referred to was passed unanimously, but I know that 
they are not all total abstinence men. For that reason I respect them all the 
more ; they make temperance the rule at their entertainments, and do 
not mean to spend any of the city money for liquor. 

Q. You have not yet answered the question, whether you think that the 
experiment of a prohibitory liquor law has been fairly tried in Boston ? 

A. If you should ask me whether I thought the city government had tried 
to carry out the prohibitory liquor law, I should say, " No, sir " ; for we have 
not. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Why not ? 

A. I suppose that I may say, because we found that when we tried to 
carry out the law, liquor would still be used. The great object of the law 
should be to suppress intemperance ; but we found, that if we shut up a 
liquor-shop in one street, one immediately opened on another, and, therefore, 
we had not accomplished the object of the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) For one reason and another, then, the authorities 
have not tried to execute the law ? 

A. I do not think that they have tried to shut up all the liquor-shops, for 
they have not thought that public sentiment would warrant them in doing it. 
When the election was pending, I was asked the question, whether I was in 
favor of a license law. I replied, that I was in favor of a judicious license law. 
Another question asked me was, whether I was in favor of carrying out the 
present status of the city government in relation to the matter of intemper- 
ance. My answer was, that the question in relation to entirely suppressing 
the sale of liquor had not yet come up. 

Q. For one cause or another, then, the authorities have not attempted to 
suppress the liquor traffic in Boston ? 

A . The same effort has not been made that would have been made had 
there been no State Constabulary, whose chief work it is to carry out the 
present law. It was considered as being their work, so much so, that the 
subject of suppressing the use of liquor has never been brought before the 
Police Committee ; but the suppression of nuisances had been attempted 
whenever brought to their notice. I have been on the jury when there were 
forty or fifty nuisance cases acted on. 

Q. Do you consider the existence of the Constabulary as relieving the 
city government from attempting to enforce the law upon this subject ? 

A. They are acting in unison to-day. There is no opposition to the Con- 
stabulary on the part of the police, and if we found that there was, we should 
at once look into the matter. Any man on the police force, whom we find to 
be intemperate, is discharged. I do not mean to say that none of them drink, 
for probably one-half of the police occasionaly take a glass of liquor ; but 
there are very few drunkards among them, and not one shall remain there 
when the fact is found out. As Chairman of the Committee on Police, I 
pledge myself for the Mayor and for the city government, that any improper 
opposition to the enforcement of any law upon the part of our police shall be 



224 APPENDIX. 

punished, and any charge brought against any member of the police, prop- 
erly substantiated, shall be attended to. Of course we cannot attend to 
charges made in the newspapers, but we can and shall attend to any charges 
brought before us in a proper form and shape. It is the intention of the city 
government that no innocent man shall suffer, and no guilty man escape. 

Q. You said that the city government had not made those efforts to sup- 
press the sale of liquor that it would have made but for the existence of the 
State police ? 

A. I do not say that they have made no effort. 

Q. Has the city government, at any time, put forth an earnest effort to 
suppress this traffic ? 

A. We have never given orders to shut up all the places of sale. There 
are about fifteen hundred of them in Boston, and it would take a very large 
force to close them all. 

Q. I want to know whether it has been attempted ? 

A. We know that liquor must be sold. We want to suppress intemper- 
ance and to promote temperance. We want liquor sold by persons who will 
sell it properly, and not sell to drunkards. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How is it that you feel at liberty to place your 
convictions as to the expediency or non-expediency of the law, against the 
duty that the law places upon you as an officer of the State ? 

A. We have to take facts as facts. There are a great many dead-letter 
laws on the statute books. There is a law that there shall be no smoking in 
the streets, and yet one man in every ten smokes. There is another law that 
you must not go on the left-hand side in the street, and yet many are found 
on that side. This is another of the laws that became a dead-letter, after the 
people found that it could not be carried out by proper regulations. 

Q. Was the law ever alive in Boston ? 

A. It is a dead letter now. 

Q. The city authorities killed it at the very beginning ? 

A . They have not undertaken to carry it out as they would a law for the 
suppression of any serious vice. I mean they have not tried to thoroughly 
suppress the sale of liquor, but they have tried to suppress liquor nuisances. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you know that there are a great many seizures 
and convictions ? 

A . I do not know how many convictions there are. I know that when I 
was on the jury we found frequent convictions for violations of the Nuisance 
Act, but not against common sellers. I have no statistics upon that point. I 
know that if all are to be convicted who buy liquor, that I should have to be 
convicted for buying it as medicine. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you believe it possible, by a prohibitory law, to 
check the sale of liquor in Boston ? 

A. I do not believe that either a prohibitory law or a license law can stop 
the sale of liquor in Boston. I think that the best temperance law is one's 
own example. I think that the law of love will accomplish more than the 
law of compulsion. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You do not think that a license law would 
restrain the sale ? 



APPENDIX. 225 

A. I think that it would restrain a good deal of it. It would shut up all 
the low grog-shops, and confine the use of liquor more to the upper classes. 
A license law would close a great many of the places where liquor is now 
sold, but would not stop its sale entirely. Any law can be evaded by those 
who wish to drink. I know that under the existence of the " fifteen-gallon 
law " men could buy twenty gallons and one gill of liquor, drink the gill, and 
sell the twenty gallons back again. 

Q. Do you know of any cases where the law was enforced against these 
low groggeries which were not licensed, while those that were licensed were 
not disturbed ? 

A. I was young then, and do not now remember about the operation of 
the law, but I used to hear of different ways of evading it. I now think that 
the next experiment should be with a judicious license law. 
Q. When was that fifteen-gallon law in operation ? 
A. I think about 1837, 
Q. How long did it exist ? 
A. I do not know how long. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) Have you any knowledge of the amount of 
the sale of liquor that is carried on in a private way ? 
A. I do not know, only from what I have heard. 

Q. Would the license law prevent such private sales from being 
continued ? 

A. I think that it would in a great measure. 
Q. Why? 

A. Because, suppose that there were three hundred licensed dealers where 
now there are fifteen hundred dealers, then three hundred would be so many 
special police officers to look out for the places where liquor was sold by the 
glass. 

Q. Would you have open bars ? 

A. No, sir. I would have a judicious law, with stringent regulations, 
and an inspection of liquor, so that no poison should be sold, but the details 
of the law would require some thought. I am not now prepared to say what 
they should be. 

Adjourned* 

29 



226 APPENDIX. 



EIGHTH DAY. 

Tuesday, March 5th, 1867. 

The Committee met at nine o'clock, A. M., and the testimony in behalf of 
the petitioners was continued. 

Testimony of Eev. Charles F. Barnard. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside, and what position do you 
occupy. 

A. I reside in West Brookline, and labor in this city as a minister at 
large. 

Q. How long have you been here ? 

A. Ever since 1832. 

Q. In connection with what institution ? 

A . Mainly in connection with an institution that I established, the War- 
ren Street Chapel. 

Q. Please state what your observation has been as to the progress of tem- 
perance, or intemperance, in Boston, in the last twelve or fourteen years. 

A. I think I have known something about it for fifty years. The first thing 
that I observed in life was the habit of drinking, which was then very common 
among both boys and men. I very soon saw that my playmates were 
sinking under this terrible evil, and, as I look back, I think that before I was 
born my mother's aversion in regard to this thing, fashioned me before I drew 
the breath of life to be opposed, heart and soul, to the intemperate use of 
wine, or any alcoholic drink. I very soon learned that the poor boys that I 
played with, and who fell, fell not only because they drank, but also because 
they did other things which were abusive, — abusing those things which were 
put into our hands by the All Wise for other purposes. My whole life has 
been a study against sin of every form, and I have studied the sin of intem- 
perance like any other sin. I have never had occasion to use the law at all. 
I do not know much about human laws. They are all very well, perhaps, in 
their way, but we are under a higher law. John the Baptist came eating 
and drinking, and the old law on stone was laid aside. " Thou shall," and 
" Thou shalt not," were lain aside when the Master commenced his career, 
and the love of God, in the soul of man, and certain moral principles and 
ideas and thoughts and feelings, are the higher law, infinitely better than a 
prohibitory law or a license law. 

Q. What is your observation of the extent of the use of intoxicating 
liquor, since this prohibitory law took effect ? 

A. I have never known so much drunkenness, and I have never known so 
much bad liquor to be used. Whether this increase of intemperance, and 
the use of the horrible stuff called liquor, is owing to the prohibitory law or 
not, I do not know, but I think that very likely it is, because when you are 
very severe, you open the door for a great deal that you do not want to have. 



APPENDIX. 227 

When we were boys in college, and were told that we could not go to the 
theatre, we would go, we would assert our independence. But when 
mother found it out, and said that she did not" want us to go, then we stopped 
going, not out of any regard for the faculty, but out of that inward law — out 
of that inward respect for mother, which was better than any prohibition. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state the fact, if you know it, as to the 
increase of secret places for the sale of liquor among the poor of the city ? 

A. I do not go to those places and know nothing about them ; only I know 
that there is more drunkenness than there was before, and more bad liquor 
used ; but I cannot tell where it comes from. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the effect of a prohibitory liquor law upon 
the cause of temperance ? Which do you think has the better effect, the 
prohibitory law on our statute book as it now stands, or a law that should leave 
to cities and towns the question of permitting the sale of liquor under such 
restrictions as they shall see fit to enforce ? 

A. I do not know much about the law, but it strikes me that we have been 
losing ground ever since we left the old system of licensing. I thought then 
that we were gaining ground and controlling intemperance ; but since the old 
license .system was abandoned and the prohibitory system introduced, I think 
that we have been losing ground. There has been a flood of liquor let loose, 
and a habit of drinking introduced, that is perfectly appalling. 

Q, What has been your observation since the enactment of this law, with 
regard to the co-operation of moral and religious men in promoting by moral 
means the cause of temperance ? 

A. I never should have anything to do with a prohibitory law nor with 
anything of the kind, whether applied to this thing or to any other thing. I 
have no faith in that way of facing things. It is not the gospel way. Our 
Saviour came eating and drinking; and the first miracle he wrought was to 
give the people good wine. He wanted good wine to be used, and to be used 
not for people to get drunk with, but to be used temperately, and to be con- 
sidered as the good gift of the gracious Father. 

Wine-drinking is no new thing. The Germans have always been given to 
drinking ; but even when they were yet barbarians, they began to control the 
matter, not by legislation — they did not fancy that, — but by certain principles 
of self-respect, — a certain sense of decorum, — -by a certain memory of a good 
home, a good wife, a good mother. They have been working and thinking in 
that way a thousand years. Take Norway, where they have long had insti- 
tutions similar to those of the United States, — the right of trial by jury ; a 
representative government, and the general diffusion of education, — take 
Norway, where they have had these things from the remotest antiquity, and 
you will find no drunkenness there. Liquor with them is as common as 
ink on your tables here, but they do not abuse it so as to get drunk with it- 
It is not the climate that prevents intemperance ; for the Laplanders further 
north are a drunken set, and the Scotch and Swedes, on the same line of 
latitude, are quite intemperate when compared with the Norwegians. The 
general diffusion of property, the sense of self-respect and self-respect that 
property carries with it, the idea of every man that he is the equal of 
any other man in the eyes of the law, the idea of trial by jury, and a repre- 



228 APPENDIX. 

sentative government, — all these influences acting on the free nations of the 
north of Europe, — all these have tended to free the people of Norway from 
intemperance and leave room for hope for America hereafter. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I understand you to say that under the license 
law, regulating and restraining the sale of liquor, things were better than they 
arc now, and that they have been growing worse ever since that law was 
changed ? 

A. That is my impression. 

Q. How long ago was that ? 

A. I do not remember. 

Q. Can you not tell pretty nearly ? 

A. I do not trouble myself about these laws. I have never read the liquor 
laws. 

Q. I should like to have you fix a date when things were better than they 
now are ? 

A. About the time when Theodore Lyman was Mayor. 

Q. Were they better then than now ? 

A. That is my impression. 

Q. Do you know how many were licensed then ? 

A. I never went into those facts. I had no time to learn facts and figures, 
but I have a general impression. 

Q. Do you know how long- this prohibitory law has been in force ? 

A. I do not know much about the prohibitory law. 

Q. Then how do you know that it was better under the license law than it 
is under the prohibitory law ? 

A. I have a general impression to that effect. 

Q. Can you state whether the prohibitory law has been in force five, ten 
or twenty years ? 

A. No, sir. I have been so busy saving drunkards by hundreds and 
thousands, that I have not troubled myself about human legislation. 

Q. You speak of the old license law " restraining and regulating ; " what 
facts have you to show that it did " restrain and regulate ? " 

A. I have my impression. I do not suppose that I could base it on facts. 

Q. You cannot fix the date when things were so much better than now ? 

A. I never trouble myself about dates. 

Q. Do you know what kind of a license law was in operation at the time 
that Theodore Lyman was Mayor ? 

A. I do not know much about it. I do not care much about licenses. I 
would leave it as I do money, — I would- leave it free. I believe in free trade. 

Q. You do not believe in restraining men ? 

A . I have never had occasion to use law. Even where a reformed drunk- 
ard became my greatest enemy, I left him in the hands of God, and in the 
hands of these excellent representatives of the General Court. 

Q. Can you tell me any particular preference that you have between the 
license law and the prohibitory law ? 

A. I think that you do not carry out your prohibitory law. I find that 
the rich folks have their liquor. The man who objects to my giving away a 
bottle of wine to a dying man, orders his champagne by the dozen. 



APPENDIX. 229 

Q. I want to know if both rich and poor did not get liquor under the 
license law ? 

A. I dare say they did, and they do now; but the rich get the advantage 
of the law now, and the poor suffer. 

Q. How do the poor suffer ? 

A. Because they see the rich man in Mt. Vernon Street, or somewhere 
else, getting and drinking his wine, and they cannot get a single glass. 

Q. Why can't they ? 

A. Because somebody would be around to catch them at it ; they would 
break the law. 

Q. Is the law so strictly enforced that a poor man cannot get a glass of 
liquor in Boston ? 

A. No, sir ; but my impression is, that where you do enforce the law, you 
enforce it on the poor people, the poor drinker and the poor seller. 

Q. Peter Brigham was a poor man was he not ? 

A. I do not know whether he was rich or poor. 

Q. You have expressed an opinion that matters were better under the 
license law than they are now, — that the license law restrained and regulated 
the sale of liquor ; I want you, if possible, to fix the time when things were 
better, and also to state what sort of a license law we had then V 

A. I never read that law, nor this law, nor any of your laws. I have 
never had occasion to use the law at all. I have prevented intemperance in 
thousands of cases without law. 

Q. I understood you to say that under the Christian dispensation we are 
under moral and religious influences ; those are the influences that you most 
rely upon ? 

A . Free grace and universal salvation. 

Q. You think that is the higher law ? 
• A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you not think that it is necessary to have a lower, as well as a 
higher law ? 

A. We license the sale of gunpowder; I would put the licensing of the 
sale of spirits upon the same footing. 

Q. What sort of a license law would you have? 

A. I have never been asked to make a law, but I can tell you. 

Q. Suppose you give us a sketch of the law that you would have ? 

A. I would take up the idea of my friend " Carl," in the Transcript of 
last night. I would have a very brief law of, perhaps, eight lines, that any- 
body coulc 7 read and understand, and I would put it in force, whether it hit 
the rich 01 the poor man. 

Q. What would that law in eight lines be ? 

A. It is not written yet. 

Q. I would like to see you put it into eight lines. 

A. If it will do any good, I will present a bill of my own before this 
session closes. 

Q. Can you not make a sketch of it, and hand it to us in a day or two ? 

A I have never been used to using law at all, and might cut my fingers 
off if I attempted it. I am no lawyer. 



230 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do I understand you that you do not believe in law at all to forward 
moral reforms ? 

A . Not to law as superior to the law that we have in the gospel. 

Q. Who does ? 

A. I hope nobody. 

Q. I do not know that anybody does. Of course, law amounts to little or 
nothing independent of religious and moral influences. 

A. I will tell you how it struck me when Lyman was mayor. We had 
one of our little parties for the children going on on the 4th of July. I went 
to him to get a tree. He said that he could give me no tree, but would give 
me ten dollars to buy a tree with. He said, " I bid you God-speed. I want 
you to continue to entertain our people for the sake of preventing their 
becoming intemperate ; for," said he, " when I was in Europe, I studied the 
habits of the German people, who have been working upon that problem for a 
thousand years, and I was satisfied, while witnessing the little dance they had 
on the green by the church, although it was on Sunday evening, where the 
old folks smoked their pipes, and the families were together, drinking their 
beer and wine, — I was satisfied that when we did those things in. our New 
England villages we should have a more temperate population." 

Q. But you would not rely upon dancing and amusements alone ? 

A. Our Saviour relied upon religious influences, with a corresponding 
grace of God in the heart. He did not look to the law ; the law took Him 
and crucified Him, and that was the last of the law, I hope. 

Q. You say that when our Saviour came He dispensed with the command 
" Thou shalt" and " Thou shalt not ; " but did He not reply, when the young 
man inquired of Him how he could enter the kingdom of Heaven, " Keep the 
commandments ? " The commandments say, " Thou shalt not kill ; " " Thou 
shalt not steal ; " " Thou shalt not commit adultery ; " " Thou shalt not bear 
false witness." Are not these prohibitions a part of the Christian as well as 
of the Mosaic dispensation ? " 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. If he used them, shall not we ? " 

A. And then He added, " Sell all thou hast and give to the poor " 

[The Chairman suggested that the discussion was wandering from the 
subject.] 

Q. During what years was Mr. Lyman mayor of Boston ? 

A . I do not remember. I have a very bad memory about figures. It is 
very easy to turn to the record and see when he was mayor of Boston. 

Q. If you were told that Mr. Lyman licensed six hundred persons in the 
city of Boston to sell liquor, and that there were three or four hundred who 
sold without license, would you believe it ? 

A. Well, I do not know. I never took any pains to look at the figures in 
connection with that subject. 

Q. You made a statement, however, that it was much better under the 
license, than under the prohibitory law. We want to have the facts on which 
you base your statement ? 

A. I cannot give you facts and figures ; I can only give you my general 
impression. 



APPENDIX. 231 

Testimony of Samuel F. Mc Clear y. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What position do you occupy in the city govern- 
ment. • 

A. I am City Clerk of Boston. 

Q. For how many years have you had that office ? 

A. The present is my sixteenth year of service. 

Q. Will you be good enough to state, briefly, the mode adopted by the 
city government in selecting jurors ? 

A. In the month of July, an order is passed to have the jury list revised. 
The names of those who have died, or known to have removed out of the 
city are taken off the list. The remainder are then counted, and the number 
of jurors to which the city is entitled, is ascertained. That number is divided 
among the different wards, of the city in proportion to the number of voters 
in those wards. The last voting list is then given to the alderman of each 
ward, with the request that he will indicate thereon, the number of jurors 
required from his ward, and that indication is there made, on the last voting 
list. I should state, however, that previous to the voting lists being given to 
the aldermen the names thereon, of those who are already in the box, and of 
those who have served within three years, are erased, so that they shall not be 
added again. After those names are indicated on the list, the lists are handed 
to me, and copies are made by one hand of all those names, on little ballots, 
which little ballots are then folded twice in a uniform manner, so that no dis- 
tinction can be made between them. Thus folded, they are placed in the 
box, and when a venire is served upon the board of aldermen for jurors, two 
aldermen are appointed to draw the required number. One puts his hand 
into the box, which is so constructed that nothing but the hand can go in, 
and it is impossible to see in the box when the hand is in, and it is impossible 
to select any particular ballot, or to select any particular juror. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What knowledge have you of the principles of 
action on the part of the several aldermen in marking the names on the list 
given to them ? 

A. Each alderman is directed by me to designate so many jurors. He is 
cautioned not to designate those who are exempted by the statute. All other 
persons, of course, are liable to be selected. 

Q. Are these selections made with the knowledge of the men themselves ? 

A. I can only state my opinion ; I do not know the fact. The intention 
of the law undoubtedly is that the aldermen will designate the best men they 
can find in their ward. 

Q. Are they required by law to select only good men? 

A. That is a question of law, which you will find answered in the statute. 

Q. I supposed that you would know whether there is any law upon that 
subject or not ? 

A. They are required, by the language of the venire, to draw men " well 
qualified, and free from all legal exceptions." 

Q. Is that the precise language ? 

A. I think it is. 

Q. Does the venire follow the statute ? 

A. I do not know as to that point. 



232 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you any knowledge whether in the discharge of this discretion 
by the aldermen, liquor-sellers have been selected by them, and their names 
placed in the jury-list, so that they are liable to be drawn on the traverse 
jury ? 

A. Yes, sir. The names of liquor-dealers have been put into the box. I 
do not believe, however, that they were selected upon that account, — because 
they were liquor-dealers. 

Q. But you know that men were selected who were' known to be liquor- 
dealers? 

A. I presume they were known to be. 

Q. Have you known any instances where, in certain sections of a ward, 
as in Ward 7, or in any of the lower wards of the city, where the greater 
number of the men selected by the aldermen for a number of years, have 
been liquor-dealers ? 

A . I am not aware of any such instances. 

Q. Have you any such knowledge upon the subject, as would enable you 
to say, that nothing of that sort has occurred ? 

A . No, sir ; I could not say that nothing of the sort has occurred. 

Q. You are aware, however, that it has not been an uncommon thing to 
select liquor-dealers as jurors ? 

A. I know that liquor-dealers have been put into the jury-box. Such 
men, for instance, as Parker and Richards. 

Q. Do you know that men are put in there who are so well known as 
liquor-dealers, that they could not be put in without the knowledge of the 
fact that they were liquor-dealers ? 

A. I presume such well known men, would be known to be liquor-dealers. 

Q. Has it not been very common, very usual, to select such men ? 

A. Mr. Parker's name was put in the jury-box, but cannot be put in again 
for three years more. When the three years are past, he being a prominent 
individual in his ward would probably be again selected. 

Q. Do you think there is as much care to select men of prominence in 
the community who are not liquor-dealers, as there is to select such men who 
are liquor-dealers ? 

A. I do not think that enters into the choice of the aldermen at all. 

Q. Then how should it happen that the aldermen should be watchful to see 
when such men as Harvey D. Parker and Henry Richards, could be put in again ? 

A. Richards would be taken as soon as Parker. They take men known 
to them, prominent individuals, men of influence and good judgment. 

Q. Do they, as you are aware, make any objection to a man because he is 
a liquor-dealer ? 

A. Liquor cases are not the only ones tried. They make no objection to 
any man on account of his business. 

Q. Do they put counterfeiters on the jury, because there are counterfeiters 
to be tried ? 

A. I am not aware of it. 

Q. Or gamblers ? 

A. I do not know that we have any. 

Q. Have you any gamblers' names on the list ? 



APPENDIX. 233 

A. I have no acquaintance with any of that class. 

Q. Do you suppose that their number is so few that there are no names of 
gamblers on the list ? 

A. If so they are unknown to me. 

Q. And unknown to the aldermen ? 

A. I should hope so. 

Q. Do you suppose that there could be none found in the jury-list ? 

A. I venture to say that there are none. I do not think that any alderman 
would put the name of a man on the jury-list whom he knew to be a gambler. 

Q. Do you know whether or not the names of gamblers on the voting 
lists have ever been selected as jurors ? 

A. I do not know of any gamblers at all. 

Testimony of Charles Russell. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Princeton, county of Worcester. 

Q. How lq.w' have you resided there ? 

A. I have always resided there. 

Q. I would inquire of you, from your own observation in the county of 
Worcester, as to the condition of things in regard to intemperance, for the 
last ten or fifteen years, under a prohibitory liquor law. 

A. I can speak only of my own town. I am not abroad much and do 
not know what may be the condition of the neighboring towns. I think, 
however, that in the town where I reside, intemperance has been rather on 
an increase for some years past. I will here state that my own impression 
has been for a number of years, and now is, that a license law would be 
better than a prohibitory law. I do not wish, in saying this, to be misunder- 
stood. I do not desire to go back to the old license law as it existed fifty 
years ago, but I mean such a license law as was in operation at the commence- 
ment of the temperance reform. I attended the first temperance meeting that 
was ever held in the town of Princeton, to my knowledge, and that was more 
than fifty years ago. It was called by the Rev. Dr. Murdoch, and the cause 
of temperance was advocated in that meeting. 

Q. Confine yourself as much as you can to the comparative merits of the 
two systems of legislation. 

A . I was going to say that I think the temperance reform in that place 
dated from that meeting. 

Q. In your opinion, has there been the same amount of effort by moral 
means, put forth for the suppression of intemperance, since the enactment of 
the prohibitory law that there was before ? 

A. I do not think there has. 

Q. Is that your opinion generally in regard to the county of Worcester ? 

A. I have no doubt that is the fact. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How long since you have had a license up there 
in that town? 

30 



234 APPENDIX. 

A. I am not able to say, but I should think it might be over thirty years 
since a license was granted. 

Q. How did the law operate when licenses were granted in Worcester 
County ? 

A When the temperance reform commenced the retailers of spirituous 
liquors began to give up the sale of it, the selectmen, in many towns refusing 
to approbate. I suppose you are familiar with the manner of licensing in the 
olden times. The application required the approbation of the selectmen, 
certifying that the applicant was of good moral character. 

Q. You say that you think there is more intemperance now than there was 
before you had any prohibitory liquor law ; will you please to fix the dates 
and state at what time there was less intemperance than now ? 

A. I can speak only for my own town, but I think intemperance has 
increased ever since the retail trade was entirely stopped. There were three 
stores in that town that retailed spirituous liquors at the time the temperance 
reform commenced. First one did not ask for a license, and quit the sale. 
Then another dropped off. Another continued to sell, but he was more cau- 
tious after that, a little more particular to whom he sold liquor, and the last 
year that he sold he refused to sell to any one unless for medical purposes, as 
the agents now sell. The consequence was that people would send out of 
town for it, — they would send a keg to Boston and get five gallons at a time. 

Q. Was that a very common thing ? 

A. I cannot say. It was the practice of a great many and is now. Nobody 
can sell it there ; but my opinion is that most of the people now use it in some 
form. Those who use it to excess find a thousand facilities for getting it from 
Boston. Even in Princeton, where we have to go six miles to reach a rail- 
road, they find ways of sending to Boston for it. There is a market wagon 
running here every week, there are stage-coaches connecting with the rail- 
road, and, in addition, there are every-day teams carting wood and lumber 
into Worcester, so that they have every facility for sending where they can 
obtain this liquor, and instead of going to the store, as they did thirty years 
ago and getting a pure article, they now get what I suppose is adulterated. 

Q. Then the stopping of the sale in Princeton was no great advantage, 
when they can send to Boston and get it ? 

A. Some think that if they had continued to sell as they did at the time 
the sale was stopped, that there would have been as much intemperance in 
Princeton as there is now. 

Q. Suppose that the law should be enforced here, so that they could not 
buy the five gallons of liquor to carry home ; suppose that when you have no 
sale there, it should be stopped in Boston also, would it not be a great 
improvement ? 

A. If you can entirely stop the trade in Boston and everywhere else, we 
do not know what they would resort to. You can answer as well as I, 
whether stopping the sale takes away the appetite and the desire of men for 
liquor, and whether a dozen men might not club together in that event, and 
send even to New York to get a barrel of whiskey. 



APPENDIX. 235 

Q. Do you not think a great majority of people drink when they have no 
particular appetite, and only because it is in their way, or because they are 
invited in a social way to take a glass ? 

A. Not so much now as formerly. In former times it was customary to 
use spirits even at funerals. I have seen seventy-four years, and I can look 
back a good ways, and I can recollect when I was a boy of going to funerals* 
and seeing rum passed around to the mourners. That thing is now done 
away. I do not believe there is a town in the county of Worcester where the 
people are more temperate than they are in Princeton ; but I think there has 
been some change there. I think the people now use cider more than they 
did before the temperance reform commenced. 

Q. Do you know of any intemperance resulting from the use of cider ? 

A . I do not, nor from wine. 

Q. Did you ever, from your observation, know of any case of intemperance 
resulting from the use of cider ? 

A. A great many years ago, I recollect some old strollers that came 
around among the farmers, and the farmers would give them cider to get rid 
of them, and sometimes they would get drunk. 

Q. Do you not know of some pretty respectable mechanics and farmers that 
used to drink cider to great excess ? 

A. They would be considered now as drinking to excess. 

Q. Have you not seen even respectable people intoxicated with cider ? 

A. I do not think that I ever did see what I would call a respectable 
person intoxicated with cider. 

Q. Do you not think the farther away liquor is put, and the more out of 
sight it is, the less temptation there is to drink ? 

A. It is a question with me, whether you could put it far enough away to 
remove the temptation. I suppose, of course, if a man could not possibly get 
any liquor in any way, he would not use it. 

Q. I want you to fix the time, as definitely as you can, when things were 
so much better than they are now ? 

A. About fifteen years ago. That, I believe, was about the time that the 
prohibitory liquor law commenced operation. When the fifteen-gallon law 
was passed, there was a reaction in the town of Princeton at the very next 
election. 

Q. You say that fifteen years ago things were better than now, and that 
intemperance has increased since that time ? 

A. I think that there is more intemperance now than there was fifteen 
years ago. • 

Q. What sort of a law did you have fifteen years ago ? 

A. There were no licenses granted. I believe that the old license law was 
upon the statute book, but the county commissioners refused to license. 

Q. You had, therefore, a prohibitory law then, when you say things were 
better than now ? 

A . The operation of the law was prohibitory. 

Q. And had been so for fifteen years previous to the enactment of the 
present law ? 

A. About that time. 



236 APPENDIX. 

Q. So that that good state of things was under a prohibitory law ? 

A. Its effect was the same as a prohibitory law. The law was varied 
according to circumstances and time and place. 

Q. What is your opinion, theoretically, as to total abstinence from intoxi- 
cating drinks as a beverage ? 

A. My opinion is that a man may take moderately of wine, or any other 
intoxicating drinks, without any very serious injury to his morals or to his 
health. 

Testimony of Edward H. Savage. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long have you been connected with the 
police ? 

A. This is my seventeenth year. 

Q. How long have you been attached to the City Hall as Deputy Chief? 

A. Six years. 

Q. And before that you were a Captain of Police ? 

A. Four years I was patrolman on the street, night and day, and for seven 
years .had charge of Station No. 1. For seven years I have been police 
officer. 

Q. Have you taken any pains to observe the operation of our laws and the 
effect produced by the attempt to administer the laws in reference to the sale 
of ardent spirits upon the habits of the people of Boston, in respect to 
drunkenness ? 

A. During my experience as an officer I have had an opportunity for 
observation. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state to the Committee, as briefly as you 
can, what you have observed, and the results to which you have arrived, and 
if you have made any calculations, or have any statistics at your command, 
please produce them ? 

A. I have made some observations in relation to the drunkenness which 
has necessarily come under my observation, and produced an effect upon my 
mind. Since I have been in the service, I have kept a copy of the printed 
reports of the Chief of Police, for each year since 1850, and have taken pains 
to have them bound in a book, which is, I suppose, the only full copy that 
there is in existence. When this question came up,' feeling a good deal of 
interest in the matter, for my own curiosity I made a table to see as near as 
can be the relative condition of things, and since I have been summoned to 
testify here, I have made some addition to the table. 

Q. Will yoipplease to state the result of your observations ? 

A . The police of Boston became an executive power, so far as police mat- 
ters were concerned, in 1854. Prior to that time the force were divided 
between the watch and the police, the police were day officers and the watch 
were night officers. I have no records prior to 1854, when the two depart- 
ments were organized in one. I have made a table, beginning with the year 
1854, and ending with the close of the year 1866. The table which I have, 
shows how many liquor shops there have been, and what has been the course 
pursued in regard to them, and what the facts were in relation to the vice of 



APPENDIX. 237 

drunkenness. In the table, I have given each year, the population, either 
estimated or recorded, and the number of arrests. 

Q. The number of arrests for what ? 

A. For all kinds of crime. The number of arrests, the number of lodgers, 
the total number of drunken cases, &c, are given. In 1864, you will remem- 
ber, that the Chief testified, it was ordered that those parties who were 
arrested, and were but partially drunk, and whom it was thought proper and 
humane to discharge, should be classed amongst " lodgers." These are, there- 
fore, here put down as lodgers, although under the influence of liquor. From 
an examination of the books and from my own knowledge, I believe that at 
least one-half of those designated as lodgers in the reports of the captains and 
lieutenants, were more or less under the influence of intoxicating drinks. 

I have also taken from the books a statement for the months of January 
and February of the present year. 

At the suggestion of the Chief of Police, on last Sunday I requested the 
captains to furnish me with a statement of the arrests for that day. In our 
records, a day is usually considered as commencing at eight o'clock in the 
morning and ending at eight o'clock on the following morning ; but on that 
day, (Sunday,) the arrests reported were made between twelve o'clock 
Saturday night and twelve o'clock Sunday night, showing the arrests for 
drunkenness during the actual hours of Sunday. 

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APPENDIX. 239 

Number of prosecutions by the City Police, from 1854 to 1866, . 2,172 

By the State Police, 3,093 

Number of liquor-places reported by the State Police for the year 

1866, 690 

Number of prosecutions by the State Police for the week ending 

March 3d, 1866, 35 

Number of seizures, . 36 

Number of places closed, 33 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Is there any opinion which your experience as a 
police officer in Boston, for all these years, leads you to form, and which you 
are able to give, for the purpose of assisting the legislative mind in reaching 
a wise conclusion as to the best method of dealing with the subject of 
intemperance ? 

A. I do not suppose that any opinion of mine on the subject can be of 
much use. Although I believe that during the past year the State officers 
have done there duty faithfully, and have no doubt followed the policy of the 
government, yet the conclusion that I have arrived at is this : that the whole 
proceeding of the Executive, in relation to this matter, has not made any 
difference. If you ask me why, I will simply answer, that any one who 
knows Boston at all, knows that any man who has a shilling in his pocket can 
go out and obtain rum enough to get drunk upon. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) The liquor places in Boston are now all closed 
on Sunday, are they not ? 

A. Last Sunday afternoon I took a walk through the streets to see if I 
could find any places open. I found none of the places open that are usually 
kept open on week days. I inquired of the officers in relation to it, and they 
told me that they presumed that none of the places usually kept open on week- 
day were now open on Sunday. 

Q. Were any of the bars in eating-houses, so far as you know, kept open 
on Sunday ? 

A. Not that I know of. It may be that they have sometimes violated the 
Sunday law ; but I think that, as a general thing, the places usually open 
for the sale of liquor on week days, were closed on Sunday, during the 
past year. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I understood you to say, in reply to a question 
by Gov. Andrew, that all systems have failed to restrain intemperance ? 

A. I did not say that : far from it. I said that so far as the execution of 
the law had operated upon the vice of drunkenness, it seemed to me that it 
had had no effect. It seems that from the year 1854 up to the present time, 
there has been a gradual increase of intemperance, notwithstanding the faith- 
fulness with which the law has been executed the past year. I gave, as a 
reason, that any man who had a shilling, could obtain liquor enough to get 
drunk. 

Q. Nobody supposes that this sale of liquor has been restricted as yet 
under the State Police ; but suppose they continue to close thirty or forty 
places per week. What will be the state of things by and by ? 



240 APPENDIX. 

A. If you ask my opinion upon that, 'I answer, that I cannot foresee the 
result. I think that the whole matter as yet is an experiment. It seems to 
me that there are but two ways to suppress this great evil. One way is, to 
make liquor go scarce that an intemperate man cannot get it ; and the other 
is, to place it in the hands of those who will not abuse the sale of it. 

Q. Would it not be a great blessing to make it so scarce that the young 
people cannot get it, and acquire the habit of drinking ? 

A. I do not consider that a liquor-stand would be any more of an evil than 
an apple-stand, if nobody used the liquor to the detriment of their health and 
happiness. 

Q. But when liquor-shops are so plentiful that anybody can get it, is not 
the temptation so great that many will use liquor to their detriment, who 
would not use at all if it was out of their way ? 

A. There is no question about that. 

Q. Then the policy is to get them out of the way ? 

A. I say that I can see but two ways to remedy the evil. One is to make 
liquor so scarce, that people who would use it as they ought not to cannot get 
it; and the other is, to put it in the hands of men who will not abuse the sale. 
Both ways are still an experiment. 1 do not understand that, as yet, it has 
been the policy of either the municipal or the State government to make 
seizures on wholesale dealers. Therein remains the experiment of the present 
law. What the effect would be if the State Constabulary were to seize a 
hundred thousand dollars worth of liquor at a time remains to be seen. 

Q. But do you not know that you cannot seize liquor kept in that quantity ? 
It is kept according to the law. 

A. I believe that a man who keeps liquor, and sells it continually, comes 
under that laAv, whether the sale is in large or small quantities. I do not 
think that it is claimed by any one that the present law has been fully tried. 

Q. Do you think that any serious attempt has been made to enforce the 
law? 

A. The policy of the city government and the policy of the State 
seemed at first to be about the same ; but the complaints and seizures of late 
do not seem to have struck at the root of the matter. 

Q. Do you say that the policy of the city and of the State have been 
about the same, when the city prosecutes but forty-eight cases per year under 
the Nuisance Act, and makes no seizures, and the State Police prosecutes 
some thousands of cases, and makes ten or twenty seizures per week ? 

A. The Chief of Police, when he was on the stand, explained that it was 
an agreement between him and the State Constabulary, that the Constabulary 
of the Commonwealth should be intrusted with the liquor cases, — that he 
would give up the liquor business to them, and that that was the reason the city 
police record shows but forty-eight prosecutions, while that of the Constabulary 
shows three thousand. I supposed that it was the policy of the State to begin 
with the smaller dealers and to strike at the larger ones afterwards. If it had 
been the policy of the city, it would have been done. I have no doubt but that 
the State Constabulary, with its thirty men, and the city police, with its force, 
could execute the law in any given case. I have seen no difficulty in obtain- 



APPENDIX. 241 

ing evidence. What I mean by similar policy is, that neither the city nor the 
State have struck at the larger dealers. 

Q. If you were the commander of an army, you would attack your enemy 
in the weakest point- 
ed. I should carry out the policy of my government. If I had discre- 
tionary powers, I should, of course, use those powers. 

Q. But you complain 

A. I do not complain of anything. I am very well satisfied with what the 
State Constables have done, and I have never yet said that I should not like 
to see them do more. 

Q. But you referred to the fact that they have not taken the largest 
dealers. The State Police commenced with thirty-nine men. I think they 
now have sixty-nine men. Of course you are aware that it is a force utterly 
inadequate to do the whole business. Have they not thus far pursued a 
proper policy ? Was it not an exercise of sound discretion for them to say : 
" We cannot do the whole of this work at once ; we will do that part which 
is easiest to be done, and which will do the most good ; we will first strike 
at the lesser dealers, who are less responsible, and who sell to the poor 
and make families miserable. We will first shut them up, and then go to the 
others ? " 

A . I have no fault to find with the State Police. I know Captain Jones 
well, and I believe that he will carry out the policy of his government, what- 
ever it is. I have never found any difficulty in executing any law intrusted 
to me as an executive officer of the city of Boston, with one exception, and 
that was during the riot, and then we were not strong enough. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You spoke of having no discretion in this matter. 
Do you mean to say that the police have never had full authority to proceed 
in the execution of the law ? 

A. What I meant to say was, that as an executive officer, I would follow 
the policy of my government. 

Q. As a policeman, with a prohibitory liquor law on the statute book, who 
is your authority ? 

A. My superior officer, the Chief of Police, and he is under the direction 
of the Mayor and Aldermen of Boston. 

Q. (By Mr. SpoonerJ You spoke of two policies — one was to suppress 
the traffic, so that it would be impracticable to obtain liquor, and the other 
was to put its sale into the hands of respectable persons 1 who would not abuse 
it? 

A. I did not use the word " respectable," but it is very proper. 

Q. You call the keepers of our first-class hotels respectable, do you not ? 

A. Many of them are highly so. 

Q. Do not those whom you call " highly respectable " keep bar-rooms 
where anybody can go in and get a drink ? 

A. I think, as a general thing, that at any of our hotels any person who 
wants a glass of liquor can get it. I had no reference to any particular class 
of persons. I presume you and I know that there are persons in the Com- 
monwealth to whom it would be safe to trust the sale of liquor. 
31 



242 APPENDIX. 

Q. The question is whether a " respectable " man would keep a bar-room 
open for anybody to go in and drink ? 

A . I said that I could only see those two ways of suppressing intemper- 
ance. I did not give an opinion as to which was the better. 

Q. I want to test both of them ? 

A . I can give you no opinion that would aid you. They are both experi- 
ments with me, and I am not yet satisfied in my own mind which is the better 
way. It is a great evil, and its suppression worthy the best efforts of good 
men. 

Q. In regard to your statistics of drunkenness — the number of cases vary 
every year ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. They increase rather more than the population ? 

A. Yes, sir; the present year is rather larger than '65 or '64. 

Q. Is it larger than '63 ? 

A. No, sir ; 1861 and 1863 are the two largest years. 

Q. You make the number of cases in the year 1865 between fifteen and 
sixteen thousand. His honor the Mayor, and the Chief of Police made the 
number between fourteen and fifteen thousand. Do you know how that 
discrepancy happens ? 

A. I made the first table, and I made it as I told you in the first place, out 
of curiosity. On the morning that the Mayor was summoned to testify, he 
came in and asked me if I had any statistics. I showed him the table I had 
made, but told him I had not examined as thoroughly as I would like to do, 
and was not satisfied as to its accuracy. Since then I have taken the advice 
of other officers, and have also looked over the records again. I satisfied 
myself that one-half of those classed as lodgers were more or less intoxicated, 
and that estimate is corroborated by the record of last Sunday night. 

Q. Then it seems that one-half of these are called " drunkards," from a 
sort of estimate of what proportion of lodgers were in a state of intoxication ? 

A . Last Sunday night I made the estimate from actual count. 

Q. But, whatever basis you have, it is, after all, but a sort of a guess ? 

A. It is an estimate. Last Sunday I gave orders to the police captains to 
mark the number of lodgers that were drunk. They arrested 91. Of those 
arrested, 38 were drunk. They had 56 lodgers, and of that number they say 
that 32 were under the influence of liquor, which is a little more than half. 
This is but one of the estimates that I can give you. 

Q. But, after all, it is a very inaccurate estimate ? 

A. I believe it to be as near correct as it can possibly be made ; but it is 
an estimate, as I told you in the first place. 

Q. Is there not a great deal of difference of opinion among different men 
as to when a man may really be said to be drunk ? 

A. There may be, although there need not be among officers. 

Q. During the time that you have been a member of the police organiza- 
tion, has there not been a diversity of opinion in regard to this matter ? For 
instance, in some periods, have they not called men intoxicated, whom they 
would not have considered intoxicated at other times ? 



APPENDIX. 243 

A. So I have stated, that since 1864 we call thousands of men " lodgers " 
"who were really under the influence of liquor, and who would have been called 
drunk under the former rules. 

Q. Ten or fifteen years ago, when there were fewer cases of drunkenness, 
were they not accustomed to take up these " lodgers," and merely call them 
" lodgers," and say nothing about their condition ? 

A. No, sir. After 1852, when we arrested men for drunkenness, the rule 
generally was to commit them and complain of them, although there were 
exceptions to that rule. In 1851, as night-policeman, I do not know much 
about the custom, as we had instructions not to make arrests for drunk- 
enness unless it was particularly necessary. 

Q. In 1852, then, there was a different policy from what there was before ? 

A. No, sir; not a different policy in this respect. I only know what the 
rule was in 1852. It commenced about the time that the law of 1852 went 
into force. I went on the day force about that time, and knew more about 
this matter than I did previously. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Does not the rule hold good, to discharge men if they 
will tell where they got their liquor ? 

A. That is a matter that I cannot speak of, as I see very few of the per- 
sons who are arrested. My impression is, however, that of late years it has 
not been the general custom to give them that privilege. There was a time 
when an effort was made, — when I made it myself, — to get parties who were 
arrested for drunkenness, to testify against those who sold them liquor, but we 
did not have very good luck in getting evidence in that way. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) But can you not get evidence in any case you 
wish? 

A. Generally speaking, we can ; in some cases we cannot. 

Q. On the whole, as the matter now stands, do you not think it would be 
as well to let the State Police go on with their experiment, before we go back 
to the old experiment of licenses again ? 

A. I am in the dark about that. If the State Police should carry out 
this experiment, (for I think that their policy is not yet fully tested,) and 
should make seizures upon our wholesale dealers, it is impossible to state what 
the result would be, but I do not care to give an opinion in a matter that I am 
myself so much in the dark about. 

Q. You say that in your judgment the State Police are pursuing their 
work faithfully ? 

A. I make no question about that. I think that Major Jones is doing his 
work faithfully. 

Testimony of E. B. Patch. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Lowell. 

Q. How long have you resided there ? 

A. Over thirty years. 

Q. Have you been connected with the city government of Lowell ? 

A. I have been a member of the City Council. 



244 APPENDIX. 

Q. I would inquire of you as to the present state of things in Lowell, in 
respect to the free and open sale of liquor ? 

A. I think that the sale of liquor was never more free than it is at the 
present time. I believe that every dealer sells it in the most open manner, as 
much as they please, and to whom they please. 

Q. Is that patent to every man who lives there ? Is it obvious to every 
one that liquor is thus sold ? 

A. I suppose so, sir. I do not know of a single place that has been 
closed. There have been seizures, and liquors carried away, but within an 
hour there would be jugs in the saloon to supply the place of the barrels. 

Q. How is it as to the habits of the people in Lowell, in respect to 
intemperance ? 

A. I think there is a very general want of feeling upon the subject, 
although there are some organizations that are active still ; and the habits of 
the better people have changed entirely in regard to furnishing it on festive 
occasions. 

Q. How is it since the prohibitory liquor law was passed in regard to the 
use of liquor ? 

A. I think if we look back to about the year 1847— from 1845 to 1860— 
we should find a time when there was the best condition of things. 

Q. State what was the condition of things then ? 

A . There was a universal feeling in the community in regard to sustaining 
the law. Liquor was sold at the time, but there was a strong feeling in favor 
of the law. I think in 184G and 1847, our principal liquor-dealers, our hotel 
keepers and prominent dealers were induced to sign a pledge to give up the 
business, not from prosecution, but from other causes. Liquor was not used, 
nor offered at parties ; so universally did the people refrain from offering it, 
that when it was offered by any one at a party it was thought remarkable. 

Q. How is it now ? 

A. It is almost universally used, or at least it is now used in a great many 
instances where it was not used then. I believe it is generally offered and 
used at parties. I do not mean to say that the habit is universal, but I mean 
that it is used among the better class of our citizens who did not use it years 
ago. 

Q. Have you been heretofore actively engaged in the temperance 
movement ? 

A. I have been, but am not so much so of later years. I was up to that 
time, but for several years back I have not been engaged in the cause so 
much as formerly. 

Q. From your own observation in the matter, what has been the cause of 
this change ? 

A . I think there was a great mistake made by the temperance people 
when this law went into effect, in thinking that the law was to do the work. 
There was not the same effort made by them after that. They trusted to the 
authorities to abate the nuisance. The temperance movement was not kept 
up as it had been previously. At the present time, there is a difference of 
opinion about the law, and a feeling that it has not done the work. For some 



APPENDIX. 245 

reason or other, the temperance people feci that the law, as it now is, is not 
going to do the work. 

Q. Have you been able to form any opinion as to what system of legisla- 
tion, if any, would be better for Lowell, than the present ? 

A. Well, sir, I have no system to offer. I do not know what is best. I 
am one of those who feel that generally too much reliance is based upon the 
law. I have more faith in moral influences than I have in any law whatever. 
In regard to a license law, I have never signed any petition in favor of such 
a law, or been considered as an advocate of a license law. I think, however, 
from looking over the whole matter and considering the present condition of 
things, that better measures than those now in force might be adopted. One 
great evil should be remedied, the quality of the liquor sold should be 
improved, but whether such a regulation could be incorporated in any law or 
not, I do not know. I would not license the sale of liquor at a public bar. I 
do not hold to selling liquor by the glass, nor in any other way except for 
medicinal purposes. I am not prepared to express an opinion as to what law 
will best suppress intemperance. I am only prepared to express my feeling, 
that under the present management of the law, so far as the city of Lowell is 
concerned, it is a failure ; and any person well versed in the condition of 
things there will say the same thing. 

Q. Are you prepared to speak of the habits of the middle class of people 
in Lowell as compared with their habits at the former period to which you 
have referred ? 

A. I think there has been a great change. I think that at the present 
time one of the greatest evils among us, is the use of beer and ale and porter. 
The use of such liquors is now almost universal. A very large majority of 
the laboring people use ale or beer and a great many of them to excess. 
They also use other liquors, but I know that an immense quantity of ale and 
beer is sold. I think that the habits of the laboring people in this respect 
have changed very materially. 

Q. Does the enforcement of this law, by all the appliances known for the 
enforcement of law, secure the co-operation of the moral portion of the com- 
munity in the cause ? 

A. I think there is a general lack of confidence in the law, and in various 
ways, a lack of co-operation. Men who consider themselves respectable, and 
even men who consider themselves temperance men, let their houses for the 
sale of liquor. 

Q. If it were left to the several towns and cities to say whether they 
would have a prohibitory law, or would permit the sale of liquor under such 
restrictions as they might think best to adopt, — under which 'system do you 
think that the cause of temperance, by the aid of its friends, would be best 
promoted ? 

A. Not knowing what plan would be submitted, I am hardly able to 
answer. 

Q. Take the plan suggested by yourself, of prohibiting open bars, not 
permitting hotel keepers to furnish liquor except to guests, but permitting 
retail sellers to furnish it to families for culinary and medicinal purposes. 



246 APPENDIX. 

A. I should think such a one would be better than the present condition 
of things. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Are you not aware that at the period to which 
you referred — 1845-7 — a large number of cases against the principal liquor- 
dealers of Lowell, had accumulated in the courts, and that it was in conse- 
quence of a promise on the part of those dealers to leave the business, that 
the cases were not forced to a conclusion, but that after a lapse of a few 
months, their cases having been disposed of, they returned to the business ? 

A . I am not aware of that, if it be a fact ; and I was the principal party 
who negotiated with them to leave off. 

Q. What were the terms ? 

A . That they should give up the business. 

Q. Were not the cases then pending, the principal inducement with them 
to leave off the sale of liquor ? 

A. I am not aware of that; it may have been so. 

Q. I was aware of the fact. I was a resident of Lowell at the time. You 
testify that it may have been so. Under this persuasive, they signed an 
agreement to give up the business, which agreement they broke as soon as 
those cases were disposed of. The dealers then believed that they were to 
be driven from the business, and the authorities could have easily done so at 
that time, but were not disposed to. The pending cases were compromised, 
and they agreed to leave the business. I ask you if you remember that state 
of things ? 

A. I do not. I remember very distinctly of obtaining the names of those 
parties, and they may have been influenced by an expectation that any 
prosecutions against them would be withdrawn. I think you are mistaken 
in the time of the accumulation of cases. 

Q. But I understand you to say that you cannot testify that it was not 
under the force of the accumulated cases that they were induced to sign the 
agreement ? 

A. I cannot testify to that. My impression is that it was not, but I 
cannot speak positively, not having sufficiently prepared myself with the 
facts and dates. 

Q. You expressed some censure upon the temperance men for not contin- 
uing their moral efforts for the suppression of intemperance. Were you not 
among the temperance men ? Why do you not continue your efforts in that 
way? 

A. Previous to the time that I left off working I had been in a prominent 
position. I had held the office of president of the temperance society for 
several years. * I had made great sacrifices for the cause. I devoted my 
money, my time and my influence to promote the cause. I left it then in 
other hands, and I have not had an office in a temperance society since. 

Q. You spoke of a large number of temperance men who had returned to 
the use of liquor ; are you one of them ? 

A. No, sir. I do not use it as a beverage. I use it as prescribed, but not 
habitually. I have lived in Lowell over thirty years, and during that time 
have never bought or paid for five glasses of liquor for myself or for anybody 
else. 



APPENDIX. 247 

A. At any period, to your knowledge, has the city government of Lowell 
used all the power at its command to prevent the sale of liquor ? 

A. I should think they had. 

Q. Will you say when ? 

A. I do not know as I can specify any particular year. I know that 
resolutions have been passed by the Board of Aldermen, and the City Marshal 
has been directed to enforce the law. I have conversed with them about it, 
and found this state of things : In one instance the City Marshal was 
instructed to enforce the liquor-law, but, in doing so, he must not go into any 
j}lace to obtain evidence. The marshal said that in nine cases out of ten 
those men whom you see go into a saloon and come out again wiping their 
lips, will, when summoned into court as witnesses, say that they drank soda 
water or something of that kind. You cannot convict on such testimony. 

Q. Why do you suppose the marshal was not allowed to go in ? 

A. I suppose there was objection to that mode of acquiring evidence. 

Q. Do you feel that there was really any intention to execute the law ? 

A. Some years there has been and other years there has not been. 

Q. Do you think such a business as the liquor traffic can be broken up in 
a moment, even with the best of intentions ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you think there ever was such a continuous effort, — such a continu- 
ous purpose — on the part of the city government of Lowell, as would amount 
to a fright to the liquor-sellers, or raise any serious apprehension in respect to 
their business ? 

A. Perhaps not. 

Q. You spoke of liquor-sellers in 1845, '46 and '47, giving up their busi- 
ness, but state that you are not aware that it was done under the pressure of 
pending cases ; do you know what sort of a law was in operation then ? 

A. I do not know that I can state, precisely, what sort of a law it was. 

Q. It was the old license law ; but are you aware that the license law was 
administered as a strictly prohibitory law ? 

A. There were no licenses then. 

Q. So far then as the government was concerned, it was strictly prohibi- 
tory ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. But it was not enforced strictly as a prohibitory law ? 

A. Various difficulties have been in the way of enforcing the law. 

Q- Then that good state of things that you referred to, as in contrast with 
the existing state of things, was under a prohibitory law ? 

A . The prohibitory law had become a dead letter, to some extent. The 
difficulty which existed then, (and exists now,) was in obtaining convictions. 

Q. It was under a license law which gave no licenses, but was admin- 
istered as a prohibitory law, and so far as the law was concerned, was 
prohibitory, that that good state of things existed. Was that not the fact ? 

A. I suppose that is a well-known fact. 

Q. Is it not true that there have been temperance efforts by associations, 
by public meetings, and the like, in Lowell, all along through these last fifteen 
or twenty years ? 



248 APPENDIX. 

A. Occasionally they were, but not as formerly. 

Q. How often do you think that public meetings were formerly held ? 

A. They were always held once per week, and sometimes oftener. 

Q. You would not say always ? 

A. Nearly always. We had meetings in the public hall on Sunday 
evenings, and the best lecturers in the county gave addresses. 

Q. During what portion of the year ? 

A. It may be that during some of the summer months there were no 
meetings, but there were more than half the year. 

Q. Are you not aware that things look bright in the distance ? 

A. Sometimes they do ; sometimes they look otherwise. 

Q. If you and the friends of temperance would not have open bars in 
in Lowell, why have you not closed the bars there ?' 

A. Do you ask me why / have not closed the bars ? 

Q. I ask why the authorities, or the citizens and the authorities, do not 
close the open bars, if such is their wish ? 

A. They cannot do it. 

Q. Do you think that they cannot do it ? 

A. I do think that they cannot do it "with public opinion as it is at 
present. 

Q. Of what opinion do you now speak ? 

A. I speak of the opinion of the men of influence in Lowell. 

Q. Of the men who constitute the government of the city ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. They do not want to close the bars ? 

A. They have no faith in the law. 

Q. Do you mean to say that the officials of Lowell do not want to close 
the open bars ? 

A. I do not think that they do. 

Q. If the men of influence want to do it, why are they not in office ? 

A. You must attend the public meetings to see. Men get into office by 
"wire-pulling," &c. 

Q. Do I understand you as saying that men of influence in Lowell wish to 
close the open bars ? 

A. I have no doubt but that you could get an almost unanimous vote to 
have them closed. 

Q. Then why is not the law executed in Lowell ? 

A. Why is it not executed in Boston ? 

Q. Public opinion, they tell us, is against it — that the majority is in favor 
of open bars ; but you say that they do not think so in Lowell ? 

A. My impression is that there would be a good vote in favor of the 
measure. 

Q. Is it a matter of record that these influential citizens want the State 
Police to visit Lowell ? 

A. I have never heard any opposition expressed. 

Q. They are welcome there ? 

A. They are. so far as I know. 

Q. Do they grieve over their non-success ? 



APPENDIX. 249 

A. That is a question you can as well answer as myself. I am not in a 
position to know the private feelings of everybody. 

Q. Your want of confidence in the law upon this subject, I understand, is not 
confined to this law in particular. You place more faith in other influences 
than the law, do you not ? 

A. I would not vote for abolishing all law on the subject, but I would 
have such a law as the community would sustain, or else I would not think 
much of the law. 

Q. What particular object is there in having a law to continue an existing 
evil, if public opinion will not sustain it ? 
A . I do not understand your question. 
Q. I understand you to regard the open traffic as an evil ? 
A. I do. 

Q. If public opinion demands an open traffic, do you think it wise to 
sanction that open traffic by law ? 

A. I do not quite understand your question now. 

Q. It seems to be assumed here that public opinion will not tolerate the 
suppression of the open traffic in intoxicating liquors. My question is, What 
good is to be gained by a law sanctioning the traffic ? 

A. I think that the public opinion of Lowell would sanction the suppres- 
sion if it could be done. 

Q. If the existing law cannot suppress it, how can a license law ? 
A. I do not think that any law can entirely suppress the sale. I think, 
however, it might be regulated. 

Q. How does throwing the arm of the law around a man selling liquor by 
the glass, regulate the sale ? 

A. I am not prepared to state any theory of license, having been called 
here unexpectedly. 

Q. But you have said that you would not sell by the glass ? 
A. I have. My theory about licenses would be something like this: 
Liquor should never be sold as an article of traffic alone. Its sale might be 
permitted to guests at hotels, and for medicinal and mechanical purposes ; but 
under extreme restrictions as to whom it was sold. I would make the law so 
strict that a license would not be worth a great deal when granted. 

Q. Do you think that it makes any difference who sells a glass of brandy, 
in the effect that that glass of brandy will produce ? 

A. It makes some difference who sells it. A respectable, conscientious 
man would not sell it wrongly ; he would only sell it where it would do no 
harm. 

Q. Do you not think that it always does harm when used as a beverage ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is its sale as a medicine not provided for under the existing law? 
A. Yes, sir. I would not ask a license law, because I could not fully 
sanction it, but only as a choice of evils. 

Testimony of General Isaac S. Burrell. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Where do you reside ? 
A. In the city of Roxbury. 
32 



250 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you been connected with tho city government ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In what capacity ? 

A. More recently I was City Marshal. 

Q. How long were you City Marshal ? 

A. About two years. 

Q. In what capacity before that ? 

A. I have been in both branches of the city government. 

Q. What is your observation in your official position at the present time as 
to the fact whether liquor is sold or drank freely in Roxbury ? 

A. I am not the City Marshal at the present time. 

(2- What was it while you were ? 

A. During the last summer there were no liquors sold openly at bars, but 
liquor is sold by the bottle, I suppose, as I see it in the stores marked for sale. 
I am told that there are no open bars nor places where liquor is sold by the 
glass openly. 

Q. Is it sold secretly? 

A. I presume it is. I have no doubt but liquor is sold. At the time I 
was appointed City Marshal, which was in the winter of 18G4, liquor was sold 
in a large number of places. Immediately after the State Constabulary was 
instituted they came out to Roxbury, and some one hundred complaints were 
made and parties were brought into court ; and they have been prosecuted 
continually ever since. 

Q. What has been the effect as to the diminishing of intoxication or sale ? 

A. I cannot give a very correct account according to any statistics; it 
would have to be a matter of opinion. 

Q. Your opinion is what I ask for. 

A. My opinion from my own observation and that of the officers, is 
that drunkenness had not decreased. Our commitals are about the same. 

Q. Where is this liquor obtained '? Where is it kept usually ? 

A. Well, it is presumed to be sold in almost every tenement house. 
There are no bars. The officers have been instructed to go into these places, 
but they find no bars ; but still there arc about the same number of drunkards 
presenting themselves, and it is presumed that they get their liquor there, as 
they are seen to come out drunk. 

(2. How extensive are these tenement houses in Roxbury ? 

A, We have a large manufacturing population, and they inhabit the two 
lower wards, principally. 

Q. Have any efforts been made there, heretofore or at the present time, 
to decrease the amount of liquor sold, lias the number of arrests increased 
or diminished, as coining within your observation as City Marshal ? 

A. My immediate predecessor made a very strenuous effort to close up all 
classes of places where liquor was sold, and followed it up, making it a spec- 
iality in business ; but some two or three years after he was appointed as City 
Marshal he gave it up, having changed his ideas, and did not prosecute in all 
cases. When I came into office, the State Constabulary came to me and we 
issued warrants and gave such information as was desired, so far as we wero 
in possession of it. 



APPENDIX. 251 

Q. Did you have any opportunity to observe the operation of this Maine 
Law, in the State of Maine, soon after it was enacted ? 

A. I did, sir, in the city of Portland. 

Q. Who was mayor at that time ? 

A. It was at the time that Gen. Neal Dow was mayor. I think it was his 
first year ; at any rate it was at the time when it was supposed, (and I presume 
correctly,) that there was none sold openly. In fact, I saw none sold any way. 
The occasion of my being there, was that a military company of which I 
was an officer, made a visit to Portland, and we found that there was a great 
deal of drunkenness there on that occasion, and that it was with difficulty 
that men could be kept sober who were ordinarily temperance men, from the 
fact that they could go into some private place out of sight, or out of the way 
of their friends, and would get intoxicated. It was set on the tables in vinegar 
cruets and all such arrangements. 

Q. What is your opinion in regard to the ability of police officers, under 
the present system of law, to prevent the evil of intemperance ? 

A. I have no doubt but that all public sales could be prohibited. 

Q. What would be the effect of that as a matter of fact in your opinion, as 
far as your observation extends, as to the secret obtaining of liquor ? 

A. I can only give my opinion that, so far as my experience for the past 
two years extends, it has not diminished drunkenness; on the contrary, it 
seems to me that a great many more females are getting into the habit of 
drinking than heretofore. 

Q. Any observations in regard to children ? 

A. Some of the older children, that is, twelve or fourteen years of age. I 
do not know as it affects children so much as females, generally wives and 
older daughters. 

Testimony of Edward L. Pierce. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are District Attorney for the South-Eastern 
District ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You were formerly collector of United States Internal Revenue ? 

A. Yes, sir ; in the Third District. 

Q. Some questions have been asked in relation to the inferences to be 
drawn in reference to the licenses now issued by the United States' authorities, 
and those issued two or three years ago. Has the matter ever been the subject 
of attention on your part ? 

A. The number of licenses issued is diminished. 

Q. Can you state the reason why ? 

A. It was diminished from this circumstance: that parties were averse 
to taking out licenses from the fear that they would be used as evidence 
against them in the criminal courts when they were on trial for the sale of 
liquor, and for that reason they declined to take them. The United States 
officers — the assessors and collectors — would pursue a person not taking a 
license, where it was a clear and plain case of a public bar ; but in that large 
class of cases, where the business retired to a more private sale, and the 



252 APPENDIX. 

evidence was more difficult to obtain — as in most of the trials in Norfolk 
County it was — the United States officers would not think it would pay to 
pursue them ; therefore a party would not procure a license. These figures 
do not show at all a decrease in sales. 

Q. T\yien they were first issued, was it the theory that they would protect 
the dealers against the State law ? 

A. There was that theory among the sellers. 

Q. There has been some decision on that subject ? 

A. That has been decided at the last term of the United States Court, at 
Washington. A year ago, and more recently, there has been a supplementary 
decision to that. 

Q. Have you any means of forming an opinion as to the value of the pro- 
hibitory law in reducing the amount of drunkenness from your observation as 
an officer and as a citizen ? 

A. I have no doubt that, contrary to the impression of others, intemperance 
has greatly decreased. I have also no doubt that it has little or no connection 
with any law. I think it is due to this : there is a higher intellectual tone of life ; 
that is, our people have become more cultivated under the influence of better 
schools and higher civilization. The standard of social respectability is raised, 
and people have refrained from intemperance without any reference to any 
law. I think modern preaching leads to it. The preaching of our time puts 
religion upon the basis of practical life and conduct. I think also that the 
fact that there is an abundance of labor for laboring people more than there 
used to be, also conduces to the same end. 

Q. Are there better wages ? 

A. Not so much that as the abundance of labor. No man need to be idle ; 
and idleness is provocative of the passions. I think that the abundance of 
water and ice in the cities, tend also to the same end. My experience is 
more with professional men and farmers. I know that intemperance has 
decreased largely among this class ; and I think I know that that is irrespective 
of any law. The tendency to virtue is prompted, not so much by removing 
the temptation, as by increasing the moral power within. 

Q. How is it as to the number of persons among this class who drink ? 

A . I believe that our town (Milton) is one of twelve towns in the Com- 
monwealth that have no town agent ; but I do not think that throughout the 
community generally there is one man in ten, if there is one man in twenty, 
that under all circumstances, abstains from some use of liquor. It is impos- 
sible to state the number of men in my county ; there are very few that 
totally abstain under all circumstances. 

Q. Is it a fact that this class of persons of whom you speak, do in fact use 
these liquors, yet drunkenness is diminished ? 

A. That is a fact as my observation determines. 

Q. What do you find to be the effect produced by the operation of that 
law when carried into actual execution upon liquor-dealers in your district ? 
Does it prevent the sale, or otherwise ; or what effect does it produce ? 

A. My district covers Norfolk and Plymouth Counties, and I think that 
Plymouth County is, of all others, most favorable to the execution of the 
law ; Norfolk County is an average county. In Plymouth County a convic- 



APPENDIX. 253 

tion for the sale of spiritous liquors can always be procured where the evi- 
dence is sufficient. In Norfolk County it can ordinarily. We are liable to 
have out of twenty-four jurors, or out of each jury, and the half-dozen super- 
numeraries, two or three who are disposed to take the law into their own 
hands. Practically, in both counties, proper proof of the sale of spirituous 
liquors will insure conviction. I remember to have tried six cases in one day, 
(which is about all that can be tried,) and though we had a hard fight 
of it, yet we carried each case. In the case of beer and cider, public 
sentiment is entirely against it. 

Q. In what county ? 

A. It is pretty much so in both of them. It is impossible unless you can 
introduce into the case the fact that the place is a great nuisance. If I can 
show that a great many men in a state of drunkenness are coming away from 
these places, or if there has been somebody assaulted, I can get a conviction, 
but otherwise not. In one case in Plymouth, a few weeks ago, it was proved 
perfectly clear that beer had been sold. Men have gone into the business of 
making beer, somewhat. It is very easy to do it ; and when they are prose- 
cuted, they will always produce a row of witnesses who will decide that it is 
not intoxicating, but that it will make a person sick before they have a chance 
to get intoxicated. The constables do not wish to try it, and there is no rea- 
son for their getting a chemist, and so these persons bring in their witnesses 
to testify that the beer will make a person sick before it intoxicates them. In 
this case which I speak of, the man who made the beer was put upon the 
stand, being the employee of the person prosecuted, and he testified that 
persons came into the place and drank, and did not get intoxicated. I proved 
half a dozen cases of drunkenness, and that is enough in any such prosecu- 
tion. From that case and others, I am certain of this : that juries as they 
run everywhere in the Commonwealth are against the enforcement of the law 
in relation to the sale of beer and cider. Perhaps the Committee may not be 
aware of the little-technical distinction that we have. We prosecute under the 
86th chapter for nuisances, and under the 87th for common sellers. There is a 
provision in the Common Seller Act that beer and ale are not intoxicating, 
and these persons will say strong beer, and hop beer, and it is difficult to 
make any such distinction, as the beer is commonly made from hops. As to 
the other matter of the sale of whiskey, and such like liquors, with the 
exception of two or three men who get on the jury in Norfolk County 
occasionally, the juries will convict if the case is a clear one. The result 
is that in some places there will apparently be a stop put to the sale. Now in 
the town of Dorchester, I presume there have some persons gone out of the 
business, and I should say that less liquor was sold there ; but that is a town 
only a little distance from Boston, and it requires only a little time and twelve 
and one-half cents to come into Boston and get liquor, if a person wants it. 
In Abington, and other towns further out, the number of cases brought into 
court is about the same. These cases seem hopeless. I do not think they 
will ever be any less. I had a. man convicted and sent to jail, but after he 
was released he was found to be selling again, and in a few weeks he was con- 
victed a second time. I do not know how it may be in Roxbury as regards 



254 APPENDIX. 

that matter. I do not know of any open bar, but I think there is one ; but 
that has been prosecuted recently. 

Testimony of Addison Gage. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you belong to the firm of Gage & Co, ? 

A. The firm is now Addison Gage & Co. 

Q. Your home is in West Cambridge ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you signed one of the petitions in reference to a license law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are a large employer of men ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And have been many years in active business ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you state what conclusion you have arrived at as an employer of 
other men, and as a man of business, in reference to the operation of the 
prohibitory liquor laws ? 

A. I signed a petition for a license law, not because I wanted liquor sold, 
as some people seem to think there will be a free sale under a license law. 
My idea is to restrain the sale, as I do not think it can be prohibited. Taking 
the large towns and cities, and, in fact, our little city, I do not think it can be 
enforced. If it could be all banished in a day I do not believe it would be a 
good thing. I do not believe in such sudden revolutions. I am in favor of 
temperance. I believe that liquor, in most all cases, does a great deal more 
harm than good ; and if I had believed that this was going to make a free use 
of liquor I should be opposed to it. I make it a rule in my business not to 
employ any man that is in the habit of getting intoxicated, particularly if he 
is a man to whom any particular work is to be intrusted. If a man applies 
to me, I ask him if he is in the habit of drinking liquor daily. My experience 
has been that there is a less amount of liquor drank now than there used to be 
formerly. Twenty-five years ago my business called me to most of the drink- 
ing saloons with ice. I had to collect my own bills, and the best time of day 
was generally from 12 to 1 o'clock. In the forty years that I have lived in 
Boston I do not think that I have drank forty glasses of ardent spirits. But I 
was surprised to find at these places so many men at that time of day. I 
would see such a class of men there daily, and I have had a curiosity to watch 
the progress of those men ; and I must say that a very large number of those 
persons whom I used to see at these places, at that time, have since become 
bankrupt. And these were men who, at that time, were men of property and 
means. And my opinion is, that if a man's habits are such that he must take a 
glass of liquor daily, that sooner or later it will affect his judgment and tend 
to ruin him. 

Q. You say that, practically, you are in favor of reducing the sale of 
liquor to its minimiun ? 

A. Yes, sir. I should be willing to reduce it to the least amount that it 
can possibly be brought to. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You regard it as desirable to abolish entirely 
the open places for the sale of liquor as a beverage ? 



APPENDIX. 255 

A. Yes, sir; if it could be done. My idea is to entirely prohibit the sale 
of liquor ; but I think, even if it could be done in a day, it might not be policy. 

Q. What do you think would be the expediency of utterly breaking down 
the public sale and restraining the traffic, blotting out the appetite of men, 
and growing a generation free from the use of liquor as a beverage ? 

A. I should think it was a very good policy; but this law has been upon 
the statute book for some time and the effect of it has not been as yet anything 
like what was expected of it. 

Q. You are a citizen of Boston, .are you ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you ever fallen into the mistake of supposing that the City of 
Boston ever meant to execute the law ? Did you ever believe for one twenty- 
four hours that Boston meant to execute the law ? 

A. That is a question that I do not know that I can answer. The law has 
been in operation, and I suppose that if they wanted to execute it they could. 

Q. As a citizen of Boston and acquainted with the various classes of 
people, did you ever think that the authorities of Boston had set themselves 
earnestly at work to carry out this law ? Were you pretty clear in that 
opinion ? 

A. Yes, sir; my opinion is that if the voters of Boston were to decide 
the question, they would vote against the prohibitory law. But probably the 
officers could not carry out the law, and considered it the sentiment of the 
majority of the citizens that it ought not to be carried out. 

Q. Have you any great confidence that the license law would better the 
state of things ? 

A . I have such confidence that I would like to see it tried, if the law 
could be according to my ideas. I do not know whether it would be practi- 
cable to make exactly such a law as I should desire. 

Q. What are your ideas ? 

A. That every town should decide for itself whether they would have the 
law or not. 

Q. Do you suppose that if Cambridge should decide to have a license law, 
and if Boston should not have a license law, it would be effective in 
Cambridge ? 

A. I think it would. The people in Cambridge who drink, would come 
here and get it anyway ; and I think that the law would prevent the sale at 
public bars. 

Q. Do you think that it can be done ? 

A. I have very much doubt whether it can be done at present in Boston. 

Q. If you could frame a license law would you attempt it ? 

A. No, sir, I do not think I would at the present time, because I think 
there would be any number of places in these back alleys and in cellars, 
where the liquor would be sold ; and the interest is so large and the public 
sentiment is so strong in favor of selling, that I think it would be almost 
impossible to prevent the sale ; but I would not have a public bar unless it 
were entirely open. I would not have the bars concealed, and the green cur- 
tains up at the windows, but I would have the sale where everybody could see. 

Q. Would you have a man put down his green curtains ? 



256 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir, I would. I believe there are a dozen glasses of liquor drunk 
from it in Boston where there would not be more than one otherwise ; because 
men can go in out of sight and get their liquor and drink it. 

Q: Do you mean to say that you would make all drinking out of sight ? 

A. I would have it in sight. 

Q. You would then only legalize what the public saw ? 

A. If a man wanted liquor at the hotel I would let him have it. 

Q. You would shame the people out of drinking by keeping it in the 
public eye ? 

A. If men did not want to drink in these places they would not want the 
liquor so much. 

Q. A man might be licensed to sell under a license law, but his customer 
might be a man who wanted to go behind the green curtain ? 

A. There are a great many who would be willing to drink right in public 
sight, but most men would prefer to get out of the way of the public eye. 

Q. Here is a practical problem. We will suppose that, under the view of 
these spectators, persons are licensed to sell liquor, and are protected by -the 
law. How would it be any easier to suppress the others ? How does the pro- 
tection of the law that is thrown about one-half, operate in any way against 
the other ? 

A. If there are a hundred men who are my enemies, and I can go to 
work and make fifty of them my friends, I think I should prefer to do that 
rather than to meet the whole number as enemies. 

Q. And you propose to better the state of things under the license law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is it true that under the old license law people were restrained from 
selling without licenses ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. I think there were many sellers. 

Q. You speak of being careful not to employ a man in a matter where he 
is to be trusted who makes use of liquors ; do you mean a moderate use ? 

A. I mean a man who is in the habit of drinking liquor every day; that 
is, a man who cannot get through a day without a glass. 

Q. Do you take ground against a moderate daily use of liquors ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You would not go against the occasional use ? 

A. Yes, sir. I would take ground against the occasional use of liquors, 
although I have kept it in my house and used it. I do not believe that any 
young man is benefitted by the use of liquor. 

Q. Then you reject the doctrine that liquors are good ? 

A. Yes, sir. I do not believe in it all. 

Q. What are the habits of the men whom you employ now as compared 
with the men whom you employed twenty years ago ? 

A. Well, sir, I have been particular to get, as I say, temperate men, and I 
think, therefore, that I have a better class of men than I had twenty years 
ago. 

Q. What do you think of the character of the men in the business houses 
and firms around you ; is there more or less attention paid to the fact of this 
sobriety ? 



APPENDIX. 257 

A. I think there is more attention paid to it than there used to be. I 
think the man whom you employ for a day's work is more likely to get 
employment if he does not drink, than he would be if he drank. 

Q. Do you observe any distinction between foreigners, or do you apply 
your remark to people generally ? 

A. I think the remark applies generally. 

Q. So far as you see it in Cambridge is it among foreigners or Americans ? 

A. I think it is pretty well divided between them. 

Q. You have a considerable Irish population ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you think the Irish people are more addicted to it than the 
Americans ? 

A. As to the laboring classes, I do not know as there is very much 
difference. 

Q. Taking the laborers generally of the town of West Cambridge, do 
you think they are more or less temperate than they were fifteen years ago ? 

A. I do not think they are any less temperate. 

Q. Then you would not say that the use of liquor as a beverage, or that 
drunkenness, so far as your observation goes, has increased within the last ten 
or fifteen years ? 

A. I should think it had decreased rather than increased. That is my 
opinion, but I have not any statistics to go from. It is merely impression. 

Testimony of Rev. I. S. Lincoln. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Your occupation and residence, if you please ? 
You are a clergyman, are you not ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I reside in Warwick, in Franklin County, and was a clergy- 
man eighteen years in the county of Worcester. 

Q. I wish to inquire of you as to your observation in the cause of temper- 
ance, and of the operation of the present prohibitory law, and any reasons 
you may have for it ? 

A. In relation to that subject, sir, I am able to compare the progress of 
the cause of temperance under the old license law, and' under the prohibitory 
laws that have been enacted since. I became very much interested in the 
cause of temperance early. I became connected with a temperance society 
forty years ago (I think in 1827), in the town of Gardner, in Worcester 
County, and I watched the progress of the cause of temperance with a great 
deal of interest from that time to this. When the temperance cause began, 
our efforts were directed solely to the men who used spirits as a beverage. 
These were the class of men who claimed our attention, before there was any 
prohibitory law. We supposed our work was to be done by moral means, and 
we resorted to moral methods ; and that society in the town of Gardner, that 
originated with only nineteen members, at the time the first prohibitory law 
was passed, (the fifteen-gallon law, in 1837,) had cleared the town of places 
where they sold liquors openly. There were two stores that sold in large 
quantities at the time we commenced, and both, with moral influence, without 
any reference to law at all, gave up the sale ; and I would remark, that while 
we relied on moral suasion, we had a great many public meetings and associ- 

33 



258 APPENDIX. 

dated several towns. I attended a great many of them, and in these we were 
most sure of having full and interesting meetings, when temperance meetings 
were appointed, of any class of meetings that I ever attended up to the time 
that the prohibitory law was passed. I was surprised very much, (though my 
whole heart was in the cause of temperance,) and I must say I was somewhat 
alarmed on account of its influence, as I feared, upon the cause of temper- 
ance. It seemed to me that the cause was going on well enough as it was. 
We were destroying the temptation, and hence the sale was being diminished. 
People were prepared to face the enemy. They were prepared to put on all 
the armor that we are called to put on in order to meet all our foes, and in 
that panoply they knew how they stood and how they were meant to stand* 
We remembered at the beginning that we had an enemy to fight with, and 
that was temptation ; but, in order to make people temperate, we did not 
think it necessary that the temptation should be removed out of the world, 
but that men should be fortified against it, and that is the idea that we acted 
upon, and we therefore appealed directly to the men who used spirituous 
liquors, to induce them to abstain ; and I would remark one fact as to the 
present prohibitory law, (and which was feared at the outset,) and which was, 
that the moment the prohibitory law was passed, the men who used liquor 
moderately (from which class we were getting the greatest number to join 
our temperance association) said : Now you are taking measures to compel 
us to abandon our cups, and now you are making a law to prevent us from 
buying and drinking what we desire. Now we say we will assert our right to 
use, and no man has a right to prohibit us from using, unless we use it in such 
a way as to intrude upon the rights of others. Every man admitted drunken- 
ness to be wrong. The result was, that the passing of a prohibitory law, 
operating against the use of moral suasion in this way, drove these men right 
off from us, and they would not come near our meetings. Before that we had 
their ear. We did not take the ground that it was a sin in itself to use it 
moderately, but that it was a sin to use it excessively, and so as to injure their 
health and make them dangerous members of society. Why did we ask them 
to abstain from it ? Because it was a dangerous article to use ; and though 
some might use it without impairing their health, yet vast multitudes found 
their appetites increasing as they used it, and found themselves at last in the 
depths of intemperance. That is the argument we used to induce them to 
become temperance men ; and it seems to me that the cause of temperance 
has gone back since the enactment of the first prohibitory law, and there has 
.been a very great change, and I attribute all the good, under this law, to the 
influence of moral suasion. All, I think, that we can ask of a law, is to 
punish men who use liquor to the injury of others. 

Q. As a matter of fact, in the county of Franklin, how is the cause of 
temperance to-day, as compared with the times to which you allude ? 

A. I was not in Franklin County at the time I alluded to first; I was in 
the county of Worcester when the two systems were tried ; I did not get to 
the county of Franklin till within the last fourteen years. 

Q. During that time, how was the cause ? 

A. The county of Franklin has no city, and no very large villages or 
places in it And I think that there is very little intemperance among the 



APPENDIX. 259 

people of that county, especially the American population. There is some, 
but as far as my knowledge extends (I am merely acquainted with a few of 
the towns in the county), I should think that, since I have been there, there 
had .been a large amount of intemperance. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) What is the opinion of temperance men in 
regard to cider ? 

A. So far as I know, they are in favor of its use. There is not as much 
cider manufactured now as years ago ; but I think that those who manufac- 
ture it are temperate in other respects, but are in favor of using that. 

Q. Does it detract from a man's influence as a temperance man to affirm 
that he has cider in his cellar, and occasionally drinks it ? 

A. I have not supposed that it did, in that county. I know a great many 
that use a little cider because they have an impression that it is conducive to 
their health ; and they use it with their meals. 

Q. When you speak of temperance men, do you mean men who belong 
to temperance societies ? 

A. There are some who do. 

Q. Is it the general rule ? 

A. They do not use it freely. They will buy a barrel of cider, and boil 
it down, drinking a little while it is sweet, and letting the rest go for vinegar. 
There is not much cider used in the county ; but it is used, I know, by a 
number of clergymen, who have been strong temperance men, but who have 
been advised by physicians, on account of some dyspeptic or bilious troubles, 
to use it, and they do so. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have you ever known a time when less liquor 
was used in a community like that you now live in, than at present ? 

A. I am not able to settle that point. In the town where I reside, I think 
more was used, and more purchased from the liquor agency in this city than 
for a number of years.. 

Q. Is there any open place of sale in your town except the agency ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You have a considerable foreign population in that town ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How many ? 

A, There may be six or seven families. 

Q. What is the principal business of your town ? 

-4 . The most valuable is pine lumber. 

Q. What other leading business ? 

A. The tanning business is carried on to a considerable extent. There is 
a boot manufactory — not large. But the farming interests are carried on 
more extensively. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Did you say more was bought by the agency ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is any of that used as a beverage ? 

A. We were a little unfortunate in our town. Our town agent was a 
man that used liquor, and used it pretty freely, himself. It was supposed that 
it was sold by this agent pretty freely for any purposes whatever. I rannot 



260 APPENDIX. 

say but that people who bought it would say that they wanted it for mechani- 
cal and medicinal purposes. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have you entertained the same opinion touching 
the principle of the prohibition policy of Massachusetts, in regard to pro- 
hibiting the sale of liquors, that you now entertain, for several years back ? 

A. It seemed to me* that the operations of it were adverse to the influence 
of moral suasion. 

Q. Have you, at any time, say within two years, expressed an opinion in 
favor of the policy of Massachusetts on this head ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Were you a member of the legislature two years ago ? 

A. No, sir. I was a member at the last session and four years ago. 

Q. Did you at that time express an opinion favorable to the policy of the 
State in that respect ? 

A . I do not recollect that I ever did. I should not be likely to, as I have 
never had such an opinion. I had feared that it would operate as it seems to 
me that it has. 

Q. Then your opinion from the beginning has been that the law was not a 
proper instrumentality for this purpose ? 

A . It seemed to me that the instrumentality of the law was not correct. 
It seems to me that the present law is not on the right principle. 

Q. Precisely why not ? 

A. For this reason, that the law makes the sale of alcoholic liquors a 
wrong, and at the same time it does not make the buying and the use of it 
for a beverage a wrong. The man who sells the liquor is made responsible 
for the use of it after it has passed out of his hands, it seems to me. I have 
always taken this ground : that the use of alcoholic liquors as a beverage is 
dangerous, but is not a sin in itself, though it may lead to intemperance, and 
to all the evils which flow from it, which cannot be described. 

Q. And you recognize the great evils of immoderate drinking under the 
present laws ? 

A . I mean this fact, — that a man could not become intemperate unless 
liquor were used at first moderately. 

Q. Do you admit that it is dangerous to use it in this way ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now, when a great social evil exists, is it not necessary to put it away ? 

A. Certainly, I think it is. But there has been a great trouble with me 
to take the ground that the law is right, when it does not carry the con- 
sciences of the multitude with it ; because I could not make them feel that it 
was a sin to use this liquor moderately as a beverage, in the same way that a 
man feels that it is a sin to take another's property. j 

Q. Have you used your influence to diminish this evil ? 

A . It has been my life-long business. 

Q. Do you believe it is a sin not to lend one's influence to put away the 
causes of these great social evils ? 

A. Certainly, I do, sir. But the question is, what kind of influence is 
adapted to the end, and is innocent and right. 



APPENDIX. 261 

Q. Now, do you suppose you can have a general and moderate use of 
liquor as a beverage, without these great social evils springing out of that 
use ? Do you, as a Christian minister, believe that ? 

A. I presume that, as long as men, using spirit more or less, will become 
intemperate, and involve themselves in all the evils of intemperance ; but I 
take the ground that we have no legal right to punish a man for the use of 
liquor, unless that use of liquor leads him to violate the rights of others. 

Q. Does the immoderate use of liquors, or do the present social evils which 
you recognize, violate the rights of others ? In families, where any member 
is an inebriate, and honest industry is taxed to repair the ravages, are not all 
of these taxes violations of the rights of others ? 

A. I admit that when a man uses liquor so as to become a dangerous 
member of society, the law may take him as a criminal and punish him ; but 
until he has used liquor in such a way as to violate the rights of others, the 
law has no right to treat him as a criminal. 

Q. Do you deny that the law has a right to punish for the moderate use 
of liquor? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you deny that the government has a right to prohibit the sale ? 

A. The government have a right to prohibit all the injurious sale, but not 
the sale itself, in toto. The present law is based on the supposition that there 
is a sale that is right. 

Q. Do you believe that the government has a right to prohibit ninety-nine 
in every hundred from selling for any purposes whatever ? 

A. I should think it had. 

Q. Do you believe it has a right to prevent the hundredth man from 
selling for any purposes whatever ? 

A. If the public good requires that the sale be limited to a few, because 
of its being a dangerous article, and because men of a certain character 
would sell it to the injury of others, I believe that the government has a 
right to prevent it. 

Q. Then you believe that the government have a right to restrict the one 
man in a hundred without regard to the inherent right of selling ? 

A. I regard this the same as I regard the sale of gunpowder. 

Q. If the government has the right to prohibit ninety-nine men in a hun- 
dred, why not the hundredth, if the public good requires ? 

A. The public sentiments on that point are different. I think that each 
man has a right to use liquors so long as he does not injure himself and others 
by the use ? 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) What religious denomination do you belong to ? 

A. Unitarian, sir. 

Testimony of Joseph Andrews. 
Q. (By Mr. CniLD.) Where do you reside ? 
A. At present in Boston. 
Q. What is your business ? 
A. Engraving. 



262 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you travelled abroad and know something of the habits in regard 
to temperance in other countries ? 

A. I have been abroad three different times and have lived in the country 
some part of my life. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to inform the Committee what are the habits 
as to the use of what are called intoxicating liquors in foreign lands ? 

A. I resided in the city of Paris once for two months, following my pro- 
fession, and afterwards for a year and a half. The subject of intemperance 
has always been prominent in my mind. For that reason, without any par- 
ticular attention to the subject, day by day, whenever anything that bore upon 
it met my eye, I became cognizant of it. During my residence in Paris, 
(and I should say that my only leisure time for recreation was Sunday after- 
noon,) after worshipping with those whom I was in the habit of worshipping 
with, I went, whenever the weather would permit, into the different neigh- 
borhoods of Paris. Whoever knows Paris, knows that the streets lead out 
from the centre in different directions, and I was accustomed to take on one 
Sunday one road, and on another, another ; and, therefore, I had a chance to 
observe the operation of drinking in the outskirts of Paris. As I said before, 
the first time I was in Paris was but two months. I was very busy and had 
not so much opportunity to observe. I saw no one intoxicated during that 
time. In the year, however, that I resided there the last time, when I had 
more leisure, I saw only two persons intoxicated. One case was of a man 
who was some little distance from me in the street ; the other of a postillion 
riding a horse, whom I distinctly saw. He was a little " over the bay," but 
not so intoxicated but that he could ride his horse. In the outskirts, it is well 
known that Sunday is a day for drinking. As I passed different localities, I 
noticed that the places where this liquor was drank and sold, were all open 
to the observer. I used to stop and look in, but I do not know as I ever went 
into any of them. I observed that they drank freely of wine on the outskirts, 
because the duty is not charged on the liquor at all until after it is brought 
into the city proper. I do not recollect seeing anything out of the way. Of 
course they were sometimes noisy ; but I do not recollect seeing any one that 
we should call here drunk. This was the case also in Italy and Florence ; 
and in a short trip to Rome and Naples, I have no recollection of seeing any 
one intoxicated. In Florence, in the winter, grapes and wine could be 
obtained very cheap. Wine was always given to the servants ; that was part 
of the arrangement that was made with them. From my own observation in 
the matter, I am entirely of the conviction that there is no possibility of a 
country like ours becoming temperate without the use of pure and cheap 
wine. 

Q. What portion of the population, in these various observations which 
you made, came under your observation ? 

A. All, except the higher classes, perhaps. There was one gentlemen of 
quite high station, comparatively, that I used to visit ; but as a general rule, 
it was of course to observe the mass of the people, as I saw them in the 
gardens and about the environs of Paris. 

Q. Of course, on Sunday, the masses go out into the country considerably ? 



APPENDIX. 263 

A. Yes, sir; almost universally. It is their only recreation. They work 
very hard all the week, and it is, as I regard it, their only recreation, to go 
into the country on Sundays. 

Q. As to the effects of these habits of drinking wine, as compared with 
the drinking of distilled liquor ; have you any observation ? 

A. Not particularly, except that some of those who began life with me, 
who got into the habit of drinking intoxicating liquor, have lost themselves ; 
and those who have used wine with their food have not, and I have come to 
the same conclusion that I had before. 

Q. How is it in Paris compared with Boston, as to the use of distilled 
liquors, and as to intemperance ? 

A. I should think there was no comparison from my observation. I should 
suppose there were comparatively no spirituous liquors drank there, as com- 
pared with those which are drank here : and as I said I only saw two instances 
in the year and a half. 

Q. I would inquire if you know anything about the fact that the liquors 
brought to this country have been fortified ? Is there any difficulty in 
importing them. 

A. That I am not able to say. I have a general impression that some 
little alcohol is put in, but it is a mere trifle. 

Q. Have you any observation as to the state of things in Boston and in 
this country ? You reside in Boston now, do you not ? 

A. Yes, sir. Not particularly as to the drinking, etc. ; but if it is proper 
to state, I have some observation in regard to the operation of this law, and 
in reference to the idea of the prohibitory law. 

Q. Will you be good enough to state it. Give the conclusion of your 
own mind. 

A. I think a prohibitory law is injurious to the true and pre-eminent 
cause of temperance. 

Q. Will you state very briefly the reason of that conclusion ? 

A. It is because in the first place I think it is absurd to suppose that the 
great majority of men, and women, too, can be made to drink nothing but 
cold water. In the second place, I think it strikes at the very foundation of 
a man's moral character. In order to reform a man, and in order to reform 
society, there must be freedom ; and I think that this prohibitory system arises 
from a one-sided and fanatical idea. It has not for that reason the Divine 
Providence behind it, and it can never be enforced ; or, if it could be, it 
could never prevail for good. It has nothing in the Divine Providence to 
support it, and it has not the best judgment and the best feeling of the better 
part of the most intelligent portion of the community to support it. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What is your definition of fanaticism ? 

A. Anything that leads men, however wise and however good, to leave 
out other considerations in following one particular idea. 

Q. Is the idea that is wholly true in itself and in its results fanatical ? 

A. The idea itself being true, the carrying out of it is not necessarily 
fanatical, but the manner of carrying it forward may be. 

Q. If a proposition embraces truth and only truth, is that fanaticism ? 

A. The proposition is not fanatical. 



264 APPENDIX. 

Q. If you were to act upon that proposition, would your action be 
fanatical ? 

A. If I left out of sight every other consideration, it would be. 

Q. Is not all truth harmonious ? 

A. It is harmonious ; but the Divine Providence teaches that in its opera- 
tions and in its words, we must sometimes bend to circumstances. 

Q. Does the Divine Providence accommodate itself to wicked men ? 

A. The Divine Providence accommodate itself by bending, not breaking. 

Q. Does it so as not to punish ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How does it bend divine law to wicked men ? 

A. By allowing them to go on to such a stage that they fear of their loss of 
freedom. There can be no reform, in my mind, without freedom. Nobody 
can become a temperate man by being prevented from getting liquor. 

Q. Have you any doubt of the possibility of growing a generation of men 
whose influence in the community shall be in favor of the prohibition of the 
sale of liquor ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you think that the prohibition of the sale of liquor is a wrong ? 

A. It comes to this, that the selling of liquor is said to be a sin, and the 
drinking of liquor is not a sin. 

Q. Is a course of life that promotes intoxication, a sin ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Is a course of life that promotes drunkenness a sin ? 

A. No, sir; the sins are plainly put down in the ten commandments. 

Q. Is there not a command which exhorts you, and bids you to abhor that 
which acts to promote an evil ? 

A. No, sir ; not that I am aware of. 

Q. Is it not a sin to disobey an injunction of the Saviour ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. And His apostles ? 

A. Well, I do not know about His apostles. I regard the Lord as 
authority and nobody else. 

Q. You do not deem it a violation of duty to pursue a course of action 
out of which all the existing evils of drunkenness arise ? 

A. There may be some sort of catch in that question, and, therefore, I 
would answer it in this way : I consider that it is a duty to do everything we 
can to promote the good of our fellow-creatures. 

Q. Temperance included ? 

A. Temperance included. 

Q. Total abstinence ? 

A, No, sir. 

Q. On the principle on which you stand, if a law by which a man should 
live is that of moderate drinking, how would you, by any social arrangements, 
customs or laws, affect the question so long as you encouraged the moderate 
use, and so long as the moderate use tended to immoderate use, and so long 
as you approach the laws, so far as you were able to discover ? 
L A. I deny the premises. 



APPENDIX. 265 

Q. Do you think that moderate drinking is useful ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You maintain that total abstinence would be beneficial to the com- 
munity ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Precisely what do you maintain ? 

A. I mean that a man may drink moderately without injury ; but I do not 
say that that is a sanction for moderate drinking. 

Q. You would not recommend the State to favor the policy of abstinence 
rather than of indulgence ? 

A. I would recommend any State or any body of legislators to make a law 
that should be based upon the principle of total abstinence, because I believe 
that if you restrain from drinking entirely, and if you prevent a man by law 
or by force from drinking when he feels a craving for it, you will only force 
him into a worse position, and he would do something worse to his character 
and to the community than he would if not resisted in this way. 

Q. Would you recommend the State to make any law on the subject of 
the sale of liquors. 

A. As to that, sir, I do not feel as if I knew anything about it. I feel 
perfect confidence in any set of men who love their fellow-men and who 
should come together and endeavor to frame such laws without any idea of 
their own personal prejudices. 

Q. I do not ask whether you would have any particular law, or whether 
you would have, upon the principles which you enunciate, any desire that the 
government should make any law whatsoever. 

A. I do not consider myself wise enough to frame a precise law, and I 
should be willing to leave it to the most rational and wise men to decide. 

Q. Why does not your principle include the present law ? 

A. It does, sir, if the community decide in favor of it; but it must come to 
an end eventually. 

Testimony of Oliver Stackpole. 
Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 
A. I live in this city. 
Q. What business are you engaged in ? 
A. I keep a public house. 
Q. What house ? 
A. National House. 

Q. Do you sell intoxicating liquors at all ? 
A. I do not. 

Q. Have you ever kept liquors since you have been there ? 
A. I never have sold a drop, directly or indirectly, since I have been 
there. 

Q. How long have you been connected with this hotel ? 
A. I have been there a little more than nine years. 
Q. Where were you before you came to Boston ? 
A. I lived in the State of Maine. 
Q. What was your business there ? 
31 



266 APPENDIX. 

A. A portion of the time that was my business in Portland. 

Q. Was a portion of that time at the time the Maine Law was enforced ? 

A. It was. I was in Portland at the time Neal Dow was Mayor of the 
city. 

Q. Did you take an active part in the temperance movement at that 
time? 

A. I was very favorable to it. I do not know that I took any active part 
any more than to speak in favor of it. 

Q. You were in favor of that law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is your observation in regard to it ? 

A. I think it disappoints its most sanguine friends. 

Q. What was the effect of it ? 

A. As to the removal and suspension of the drinking of liquor, it did not 
have the 'desired effect. 

Q. How was it in regard to the state of intemperance : did it increase ? 

A. According to my general observation, I should say that it did not. 
Among certain classes it increased during a certain time ; and that class of 
people were of the higher order. 

Q. What means were resorted to, to prevent the drinking of liquor ? 

A. I suppose that you all have heard the same that I have heard; there 
were all manner of inventions resorted to that could be thought of, for the 
supplying of liquors. I believe that sometimes it was brought in double- 
barrels and in barrels in a barrel, and I have heard it said, (and I think cor- 
rectly, too,) that they even resorted to putting it in coffins. These stories I 
have heard, and I think they are correct. 

Q. During observations of that law, did it license improper men ? 

A. Not so far as I know within my own observation. I think it did not, 
as far as Portland is concerned. 

Q. Was liquor easily obtained by anybody that wanted it ? 

A. I think it was. I have no doubt of it. One mode that was resorted 
to, which I was told of, (I was never in these places,) was, that young men 
hired rooms, and hired a man to take care of the rooms, and had their liquor 
taken to these rooms ; and that they resorted there very much nights. So 
much so, that there seemed to be an unpleasant feeling in regard to the state 
of things in reference to these young men. In other words, it did not meet 
their expectations. It certainly did not mine. 

Q. How was it with regard to the friends of the law : were they disap- 
pointed or satisfied ? 

A. As far as I know, sir, I will admit, that, occasionally, I heard a man 
who was in favor of it say that he was disappointed. But, generally, I do 
not know what the feeling was, on the part of its friends, at that time. 

Q. Since then, have you heard ? 

A. Since then, I have heard a great many men, from different parts of 
the State, give it as their opinion, that they had been very sadly and sorrow- 
fully disappointed. It did not meet what they expected. I was recently 
talking with one of the policemen who was there at that time, and who was a 
strong temperance man. I believe he had lived 'there a good many years ; 



APPENDIX. 267 

and from his experience, he began to feel very doubtful, and had, in fact, 
began to change his mind, and to think that there should be some law to 
control this " broadcast slyness," as he expressed it, which was observable. 

Q. What observation have you in Boston, within the last year or two, in 
regard to intemperance, and as to whether it has increased or not ? 

A. If I simply give my own opinion, I should say that I have been 
inclined to think that it is increasing, and rather unpleasantly. 

Q. Without taking into account your own observation, what is your 
opinion in regard to a prohibitory law, or a law that should regulate and con- 
trol the sale, and should permit the sale to some extent ? 

A. I have come to the conclusion within a few years, and more especially 
within a year, that it really would be desirable if there was some law by 
which the sale of liquor might be regulated ; such as we call a license law. 
Q. Have you any reason for that, which you could state in a word ? 
A. I do not know but I might give you some reason. 
Q. Will you be kind enought to state your reason ? 

A. I suppose we find ourselves under the present system, with a great deal 
of liquor to use in the State and in the nation. We also find a class of people 
amongst us that are inclined to have something which is exhilarating. We 
have it here, and if we have no means to stop its coming here, I do not 
know whether it is not the part of wisdom to devise some plan by which to 
regulate the sale of it. I do not think that the present prohibitory law has 
stopped the drinking of one glass of liquor ; and for all the places that we 
hear of being stopped, I think there are as many places where liquor can be 
obtained. Another reason that I will assign for some kind of a law that 
should regulate the sale is, that it appears that at present they are seizing 
liquors, and I suppose that the seizing of liquors does not prevent the liquor 
being drank ; and then, too, it is a great expense ; and I am of the opinion 
that you or I, or our children, before twenty years, will have to be taxed to 
pay every dollar of this expense ; and in addition to that, I have no doubt 
that for every one hundred dollars expended, there will be a cost to the State 
of a thousand dollars ; and for that reason, I think it is not practicable to 
prohibit the sale. That is my idea, and I will give you my opinion more 
directly on this point. I think that there will be petitions to the legislature, 
year after year, and the time that will be consumed in the legislature, and all 
the expenses which will be incurred, will cost all of a thousand dollars for 
every hundred dollars now involved in the question, in my humble opinion. 

Q. If there was such a law as the one you suggest, would it make any 
change in your own habits in the keeping of a public house ? 

A. I will answer that question in a very few words. Early in life, thirty- 
five or more years ago, I joined the first temperance society that I ever heard 
of. I joined it cheerfully, and I have never drank a glass of liquor as a bev- 
erage from that day to this. Twice I have been brought very low and the 
physicians prescribed liquor. That was a year since. So far as my interest 
is concerned, I am not aware that it would affect me directly or indirectly. 
Q. You would not avail yourself of such a law for the purposes of selling ? 
A. I never should sell it, law or no law. 



268 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You speak of your residence in Portland ; what 
was the effect as to the increase or decrease there ? 

A. I speak of my experience. I think it did not decrease so far as the 
city is concerned. 

Q. What is the fact as to liquors or statistics of crime and drunkenness ? 

A. Well, sir, I am not prepared to give statistics. I only give my 
observation. 

Q. Was not the Maine Law a subject of general interest there during its 
first existence ? 

A. With a certain portion of the community I think it was. I am not 
prepared to say that it was throughout the State. 

Q. Did not Neal Dow's operations attract great attention there, as well as 
elsewhere ? 

A. They did, sir. 

Q. Can you call to mind the fact as to the cases of drunkenness and of 
other crimes, and as to the attendance at the jails at that time ? 

A. I could not give you any account whatever. I do not recollect. 

Q. What is the opinion of the people of Portland now ? 

A . I do not know, sir. 

Q. What do you think it is throughout the State of Maine ? 

A. I am not prepared to say, sir. When you speak of the general effect, 
I might say that I have come in contact with people in various parts of the 
State, and that so far as I have seen, the opinion has been very general that 
the Maine Law had not met their most sanguine expectations. 

Q. Did it not meet some of their expectations ? 

A. I suppose that people might admit that in some of the smaller places it 
might have done some good ; but so far as the larger cities were concerned I 
think it is not so. 

Q. Has the Maine Law been sustained here, or not ? 

A. It has been on the statute-book. 

Q. Did it not come into the elections every year ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did it not show that the people were still in favor of it ? 

A. I am not prepared to say that it did. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) How long have you been keeper of a hotel ? 

A. A little more than nine years in this city, and in Portland about three. 

Q. Do you think it necessary, in keeping a first-class hotel, to have liquors 
sold? 

A. I know butolittle about it. I am not prepared to say. I have the 
impression that that is not the subject before the Committee. 

Q. I should like to have that question answered ? 

A. I can only say that there are many people travelling who will have 
liquor, and if they cannot get it in one place they go to another. I think that 
in large houses and in first-class hotels, in order to. satisfy the travelling 
community, it is necessary to have it. 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 269 



NINTH DAY. 

Wednesday, March 6tli, 18G7. 

The Committee met at nine o'clock, A. M., and the testimony on behalf 
of the petitioners was continued. 

Testimony of Right Rev. Bishop Manton Eastburn, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Your residence and position are known. I 
desire that you should inform the Committee of your opinion, formed from 
observations which' you have made, of the value of the present prohibitory 
liquor law, in the suppression of intemperance, as compared with some other 
law, permitting the sale of liquor under proper restrictions. 

A. My observations are not as extensive as are those of some of the 
clergymen of my charge, who are more among the poor, but so far as my 
observation has gone, both from my personal contact with the poor, which is 
considerable, and from information derived from those who have visited them 
in my behalf, my impression is that intemperance has been increasing for 
several years in this city. 

Q. What is your opinion of the value of the present law, as compared 
with some modification which would permit the sale of liquor under certain 
restrictions ? 

A. I am decidedly in favor of a license law and against a prohibitory 
law ; I do not think that a prohibitory law can be carried out. 

Q. Is there anything in the principles which lie at the foundation of a 
prohibitory law, inconsistent with the moral means employed to accomplish a 
temperance reform ? 

A. I think that moral means are the only ones to be used. I am in favor 
of a license law, because it would restrain the sale of liquor ; I am against a 
prohibitory law, on principle. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you say that you are opposed to law as an 
agency in this reform ? 

A. No, sir; not opposed to law, but opposed to a prohibitory law. lam 
in favor of a license law. 

Q. I understand you to say that you relied on moral means to effect the 
remedy ? 

A. I rely upon moral means mainly ; of course I would not exclude law. 

Q. You are in favor of a license law ; have you any definite facts which 
serve to convince you that a license law would be useful ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you been familiar with the operation of license laws in this city 
or in other large cities ? 

A. I am not at all familiar with the subject, but that is my view of the 
matter. 



270 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you not heard that all the license laws in the large cities, have 
failed to effect their object, inasmuch as they were never enforced against the 
unlicensed ? 

A. I do not know that I have. 

Q. What kind of a license law would you have ? 

A. I have no answer to give to that question. I have no views to express 
upon the subject. I leave the matter to those to whom it is committed. 

Q. What evidence have you that intemperance is increasing ? 

A. I speak from observations that I have made, and from reports brought 
to me by those who have visited the poor at my suggestion. 

Q. What sort of moral means would you use to carry on this reformation ? 

A. The preaching of the gospel is the first. 

Q. I suppose that you have other means ? 

A . Yes, sir. Example. I would have every one who desires a reform, 
set an example of temperance. 

Q. What is your theory in regard to temperance. Are you theoretically 
in favor of total abstinence ? 

A. No, I am not; I am against it. I have no quarrel with those who 
choose to abstain, but I claim that a person maybe temperate without being 
totally abstinent. 

Q. Your memory runs back to the time when the temperance reform com- 
menced under Dr. Beecher ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do we not regard the example of the clergy and of leading men, as the 
chief agency in promoting reforms ? 

A. Some do, I suppose. 

Q. Was not that the general sentiment of the reformers ? 

A. I am not aware that it was. The temperance reform began in New 
York at the time I was a resident of New York. It began with the principle 
of expediency ; that it was expedient for persons to set the example of abstain- 
ing from the use of brandy ; afterwards it took another shape and represented 
that all indulgence in anything intoxicating, in any liquor which might 
intoxicate if used in an intemperate way, as wicked per se. 

Q. You say that you are not in favor of total abstinence strictly. Do you 
claim that the use of intoxicating drinks as a beverage, is a desirable thing, — 
that it is a good ? 

A. Every man must judge for himself in regard to that. 

Q. But there is a general principle about it. Do you not admit that 
there are great evils resulting from its immoderate use ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Is there any great good from its moderate use ? 

A. I think that its moderate use is good for some, and bad for others. It 
is altogether a question of expediency. What is very good for one, is often 
very bad for another. WTiat is bad for one, is often good for another, and 
necessary. 

Q. Take a particular case : a gentleman drinks a glass of brandy once 
or twice per week 



APPENDIX. 271 

A. I am not speaking of brandy. I object to that altogether, except as 
medicine. I never touch it. 

Q. You mean wine and fermented liquors, I suppose ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you mean only fermented liquors ? You exclude brandy ; do you 
exclude whiskey, and all other distilled spirits ? 

A. I should object to whiskey except for medicinal purposes. I am speak- 
ing of wine and ale and cider. 

Q. Considering the acknowledged evils of intemperance, — for I suppose 
that you will admit that it is one of the very greatest evils that exist among us ? 

A. Not the very greatest. 

Q. But, considering the evils of intemperance, do you not think that an 
example of total abstinence from all intoxicating drinks as a beverage, on the 
part of clergymen, on the part of members of the church, and on the part of 
leading and influential citizens, would do a great deal towards getting rid of 
that evil — and a great deal more than counterbalance the good that comes 
from their use ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) When you speak of excluding distilled liquors, do 
you wish to be understood as desiring to exclude them by legislation, or that 
you would personally exclude them V 

A. Personally I would exclude them. 

Q. You do not mean to be understood then as qualifying the statement 
that you would leave it to each man to judge for himself, whether he should 
use it or not ? 

A. No, sir. 

Testimony of Eev. T. R. Lambert. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Will you be kind enough to inform the Committee 
where you reside ? 

A. In Charlestown, and have resided there for eleven years. 

Q. From your observations as to the effect of the present prohibitory law, 
what opinion have you formed as to the value of this law, as compared with 
some other system of legislation which shall permit the sale of liquors under 
certain restrictions ? 

A. In regard to intemperance my observation is somewhat limited. I do 
not come in contact much with those who are not members of my church. I 
have thought, however, for the last few years, that intemperance has been on 
the increase. I judge so, not so much from my own experience as from what 
I see in the papers, from what I read of the places of resort where people go 
and get drunk, and of the troubles that arise in consequence. That is the 
only reason that I have for thinking that intemperance is on an increase. In 
regard to the prohibitory law, I know but little about it. I really did not 
know what it was until I was summoned here. I had never read it. Perhaps 
it is inexcusable for me to say so, but I did not really know anything about it. 
I think that it is contrary to the genius of our institutions. I think that a 
man's freedom and liberty is in danger from it. I heard, in the cars, men 
expressing their belief that their liberties were invaded by the law ; that, in 



272 APPENDIX. 

a country like ours, they had a right to do as they pleased. I have often 
thought that moral suasion was the only -way to reach the case, and I have 
tried to adopt it in all my intercourse with men. I find that I succeed better 
by moral suasion than I do when I threaten. It is an instinct of the human 
race to resist oppression. I think, therefore, that the prohibitory law has been 
an injury to the cause of temperance in the community. It is the instinct of 
the child to resist ; tell him not to do a thing and he is very likely to do it. 
• Q. What is your opinion of some other law, not prohibitory ? 

A. I think, perhaps, that we ought to have some law, and that a license 
law would better promote the object desired. I would favor the granting of 
licenses to judicious men, who would not abuse the privilege. I would restrict 
the sale of liquors to certain places. I would allow first-class hotels to sell to 
their guests, but I would have no open bar. I think that the travelling public 
sometimes need it, and that it is also of use in certain cases medicinally. It 
was recommended to me six years ago when I was sick, and for a while I took 
whiskey once a day, and I think that it did me good. 

Q. Have you any opinion as to the effect of the prohibitory law in pre- 
venting the good naturally resulting from the use of moral means ? 

A. I think that it does. I think it raises an opposition to those 
means. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You do not hesitate to give your children com- 
mands, notwithstanding the propensity of human nature to disobey ? 

A. I do not do it when I can influence them by other means in which I 
am more successful than in that. I never command my children ; they always 
obey without commands. 

Q. Do you not, in fact, however, preserve the authority of a parent and 
apply it if necessary ? 

A. I should use it if there was a rebellion. 

Q. Why, then, would you not exercise that authority in a community in 
enforcing criminal law ? 

A. A man has his liberty, his rights ; a child is under tutors and governors. 
Freedom of thought and opinion is guaranteed to all men by the laws. 

Q. Why do you speak of the prohibitory law as against the genius of our 
institutions ? 

A. On the ground of oppression. I look upon it as an oppressive law. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state why you regard it as an oppressive 
law? 

A . I think it assumes to exercise a power which you have no right to 
exercise over your fellow men. 

Q. That is only stating the same things in other words ; you do not state 
the principle ? 

A. That is my answer to the question. 

Q. Do you mean to say that you have no reason to give why such a law is 
oppressive ? 

A. I look upon it in the light of an unrighteous law, which you have no 
right to exercise over individuals. You might pass a law for me to do some 
act of which my conscience could not approve ; that would not be a proper 
law. 



APPENDIX. 273 

Q. There is no controversy as to whether laws based upon falsehood are 
good or not ; the question is, what is there in this particular law that makes it 
oppressive ? 

A. I think it restricts the liberty which we all have. Why do you not 
pass a law in regard to eating and drinking ? I think, with many, there is as 
much, and often more, intemperance in eating than there is in drinking. I 
think the injury is as great. Men may be gluttons at their own table, and 
thus injure themselves as greatly as by drinking. 

Q. Do you think that the evils resulting from over-eating are as great as 
those resulting from over-drinking ? 

A. They may not be as great; I do not say they are, but I say men do 
thus injure themselves. 

Q. Eating is a necessity ; do you think that the drinking of alcoholic 
liquors is a necessity ? 

A. It may be a necessity. 

Q. Have you ever read any articles on the use of alcoholic drinks ? 
A. I have. In my earlier days I was the President of a Temperance 
Society. 

Q. Were you a total abstinence man ? 

A. No, sir, I was not. When it came to that, I withdrew from it. 
Q. You stood upon the ground of the moderate use of alcoholic liquors ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You believe that to be the proper ground ? 
A . Yes, sir, — temperance in all things. 

Q. Do you know of anybody that advocates anything more than the mod- 
erate use, — I do not say practise it, but advocate it ? Did you ever know an 
inebriate that did not advocate the moderate use of alcoholic liquors V 

A. I suppose the inebriate advocates drinking as much as he pleases; he 
does not exercise any moderation. 

Q. Moderation is the principle you have laid down ? 
A. And I adhere to that. 

Q. Would you let people drink as much as they pleased ? 
A . No, sir ; I desire temperance in all things. I believe that the fanatical 
spirit that has been shown in regard to the matter of temperance, has injured 
the cause of temperance. 

Q. Do you not think that fanaticism may attach to the use of liquors as 
well as to an opposition to their use ? Is there no such a thing as a fanatical 
adherence to alcoholic beverages ? 

A I do not think there is, except with the man who is under its influence. 
Q. Is not a man who habitually uses liquor, very likely to be under its 
influence at all times ? 
A. No, sir; not at all. 

Q. Which is violated by the existing law which you say is oppressive, the 
right to drink, or the right to sell, or are both ? 

A. I should think either, the right to drink, or the right to sell. I think a 

man has a right to drink, if he can get it. But I do not wish to advocate 

drinking. As I said before, I would have a license law to restrict its sale, for 

I think that there are persons who cannot govern themselves. I would intrust 

35 



274 APPENDIX. 

the sale of liquor only to proper hands ; I would limit it to a few. I think 
that the sale should be permitted to travellers who come here, and go to our 
first-class hotels, who have been accustomed to the use of liquor, or who, 
perhaps, are taking it medicinally. 

Q. Is the influence of brandy dependent upon the house in which it is 
sold, or the hand that deals it out? 

A . I would have judgment exercised as to whom it should be sold. I 
would not have a bar in a hotel. 

Q. But a room in which liquor was sold would accomplish all the purposes 
of a bar ? 

A. I would not have a public bar, where any one could go in and drink^ 
but I would let guests have it if they wanted it. 

Q. What would constitute a " guest ? *■ 

A. If you go to the Tremont House and put up, you are a guest. 

Q. Suppose you go there for a cigar ? 

A. Then you are not a guest ; you must have your name upon the register. 

Q. Would you have a law defining who are excluded ? 

A. If a man should go there merely for a drink, I would not let him 
repeat it ; I would not let him have it the second time. 

Q. Which do the more harm, the houses which are called low, which sell 
to inebriates, or the houses which make men inebriates ? 

A . I do not understand the question. 

Q. Which do the more harm, what are called low groggeries, which sell to 
inebriates, or the houses which furnish all the facilities for men who profess to 
stand upon the ground of moderate use, to become immoderate drinkers ? 

A. I think the low houses, of course. 

Q. Do you think that the destruction of men, who are already inebriated, 
is worse than the conversion of moderate users into inebriates ? 

A . I do not think that conclusion follows at all. I do not think that the 
inference is a good one. 

Q. Suppose the students of any neighboring institution should come to one 
of our first-class hotels, and perhaps call for supper, would you consider them 
guests ? 

A . I hardly know. I suppose in one sense they would be guests. I should 
not consider them as such. 

Q. Can you make a law upon that subject that would hit the point you 
have in mind ? 

A-. Yes. I think a law giving licenses only to people of discretion, people 
whom you could trust, people who would discriminate between those who 
wanted to buy, would accomplish the object. 

Q. When would you authorize a person Jiaving a license to refuse to sell a 
glass of liquor ? 

A. If the applicant was a guest at a hotel, I do not know that he would 
have any right to refuse him. 

Q. Then you would let the drinker be the sole judge, whether he should 
take an additional glass or not ? 

A. I would not let him repeat it. If he staid at the house, I would not. 
let him follow it up. 



APPENDIX. . 275 

Q. Suppose you sold to a man in the morning, would you not sell to him 
again in the afternoon ? 

A. I do not think that I would. I say that I would not have a public bar 
in a hotel where men could get drunk. I would only have liquor for guests. 

Q. Let us not deceive ourselves with a phrase. A room in which liquor is 
furnished to those who call for it, will accomplish the same thing as a public 
bar. Would you authorize a retailer to sell to a person that he thought had 
enough V 

A. Certainly, I would. 

Q. Then you would leave it entirely to the discretion of the purchaser ? 

A. I would not sell to him but once ? 

Q. You would not sell him a glass of liquor in the morning and another in 
the evening ? 

A . It would depend upon the individual wanting it. 

Q. Is the seller to be the judge whether a man can carry two glasses per 
day or not ? 

A. That is a risk that he would have to run. 

Q. Do you not think that if the clergymen of our cities, and other 
well-known and influential men, were, as a matter of sacrifice, to stand 
upon the ground of total abstinence, that they would thereby greatly promote 
sobriety in the community ? 

A. No, sir; I do not. It would interfere with the individual judgment 
and privilege that I spoke of before. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to say how your making a sacrifice, volun- 
tarily, for the good of your neighbors, would interfere with anybody's private 
rights ? 

A . I do not know that it is a sacrifice. I do not think that it would 
operate in that way. 

Q. If it is not a sacrifice, so much the more should you abstain. 

A. If it would be a sacrifice, perhaps I should make it. 

Q. But whether it would be a sacrifice or not, would not the sacrifice, if it 
be one, or the abstinence without sacrifice, if it be not one, promote the good 
of society ? You say, that the law would infringe the rights of individual 
judgment ; how does it infringe the rights of the people ? 

A. I think that I have already answered that question. 

Q. When you speak of intemperance being on the increase in Charlestown, 
do you speak of the circles in which you move ? 

A. I have no knowledge on that subject. I spoke from what I saw in the 
papers. 

Q. You judge then from newspaper rumors ? 

A . From what I see in the papers, and from what I observe of drinking 
places and saloons. 

Q. Do you often see persons intoxicated ? 

A. I hardly ever see one intoxicated. 

Q. Did you ever know, so far as your own observation goes, a better state 
of things in that respect ? 



276 APPENDIX. 

A. I do not know that there has been any material change. If I had not 
been asked the question, I do not know that I would have stated that there 
was a material change. 

Q. You are not, then, prepared to say that you ever knew a better state 
of things, as regards temperance, than exists now in Charlestown ? 

A. I do not know as I would have made that remark, if the question had 
not been asked. 

Q. Do you think it desirable to suppress the open sale of liquor in 
Charlestown ? 

A . I have already stated that I did. I said that I considered that a proper 
license law, under a judicious administration, would be better than a pro- 
hibitory law. 

Testimony of Rev. Geokge E. Ellis, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long have you been a minister of the 
gospel ? 

A. Twenty-seven years. 

Q. How long have you been settled in Charlestown ? 

A. The whole of that time. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state, in your own way, any observations 
you may have made, and any opinion you may have formed, whether as a minis- 
ter in charge of a parish, or as a general observer in society, of the effects 
produced by efforts to coerce men by legal measures into total abstinence 
from spirits and fermented liquors ? 

A. I have been inclined to the opinion, that all efforts to coerce men in 
their private habits only tend to make them worse — only tend to make them 
more determined in asserting their rights and liberty (as they call it), even to 
their own injury. A spirit of defiance is excited by attempts to coerce. I 
have thought upon this subject in its various relations ; I have had to write 
upon it, and to print upon it ; I have had natural as well as professional 
means of observation ; there have been those for whom I felt more or less 
responsibility, with whom I have had to remonstrate ; whom I have had to 
endeavor to reform, and to influence for good. The subject seems to me beset 
with a great many difficulties for which legislation is not equal, and legislation 
I think is not the only power to be enlisted in the cause. I have read the 
history of our license laws, and of the measures to suppress the traffic of 
intemperance, from the first occupancy of this soil by white men, and I see 
that with all the efforts of the earnest and good to suppress the use of ardent 
spirits, there has been a resolute opposition running parallel, on the part of 
those who insist upon their " liberties " and " rights." I have been led to 
this general conviction, that the law has the right to interpose, and the legis- 
lature to interfere in the matter of temperance, only when intemperance is 
likely to entail wrong and evil on the community in the way of pauperism or 
vice. 1 have, therefore, thought that the suppression of public bars, connected 
with, hotels and dram-shops, was clearly within the province of law, and that 
the law might prohibit the sale of liquors, according to the old phrase, " to 
be drunk on the premises." There are so many legitimate and innocent and 
harmless uses of every grade and kind of intoxicating liquors, that individuals 



APPENDIX. 277 

will assert their right to purchase them without much difficulty or annoyance. 
I have within the course of the year had two or three cases, where, in my 
professional rounds, I have found poor and afflicted persons, who are recom- 
mended by a physician to use spirits. I do not keep any in my own house, 
and I feel at perfect liberty to go anywhere I please and buy any kind of 
liquor that may be needed, and carry it to the needy and sick. And I should 
do this in spite of any laws of the Commonwealth upon the subject, for I feel 
that I have a right to do it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You speak of having read the history of the 
license laws of this country. Does your reading of history not show you this 
fact, that when the authorities have granted licenses for the sale of liquors, 
they either licensed so many that there was no restraint upon the traffic, or 
else they failed to suppress the sale of liquors by the. unlicensed V Have you 
not observed that ? 

A. I have observed that the license laws, like all others upon the subject, 
are inoperative ; that where there are masses of human beings, as in cities, of 
such mixed characters and nationalities, that it is utterly impossible to sup- 
press the sale of liquors ; but that a license law would be of value in small 
country towns, where the majority of the people were virtuous and correct 
and self-restraining, and where, without a license law, it would be possible for 
any poor, miserable character to set up a groggery. 

Q. Then you feel that any license law that you could get, would be useful 
only in small communities ? 

A. It would operate to the best effect in small communities, and would be 
very imperfect in its action in large cities, as indeed all similar laws are. I 
do not believe that laws can suppress gambling, or sensual vices ; they are in 
the province of morals, and law will never be a substitute for the God-given 
conscience. 

Q. Do you not believe in laws to suppress gambling, and other vices ? 

A. I do not say that I do not believe in the wisdom of passing them; but 
I say that they are incompetent to suppress vice. 

Q. Do you know of any man who attempts to carry on reform exclusively 
by law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do not people generally feel that law can do nothing unless preceded 
by moral means ? 

A . I think that I have met men who relied upon law without being willing 
to use moral means. They were so engaged in administering the law, that 
any moral influence that they might otherwise have exerted, would alienate, 
rather than win. 

Q. Do you speak of temperance bodies acting in that manner ? 

A. No, sir ; I speak of individuals. 

Q. Have you not also seen individuals who relied upon moral suasion, and 
who believed in neither law nor gospel, for the reformation of the world ? 

A. I do not know that I ever did. I believe the best influence is that 
of the family, — home influence. 

Q. Everybody admits that that is the best; but the question is, whether 
we shall dispense with law because there are two agencies ; — whether we may 
not make use of more than one agency ? 



278 APPENDIX. 

A. I do not understand the question to be whether we shall dispense with 
law or not, but as to what method of law shall be used. 

Q. I think of moral agency as being the best upon which we could rely. 

A. Moral agencies are the ones upon which we must most rely ; for the 
history of license laws proves that they have never effected their purpose in 
this respect, nor have prohibitory laws for the suppression of intemperance, 
ever reached the root of the evil. 

Q. They never have rid us from the evil of intemperance. Have laws 
against the other vices ever succeeded in suppressing them ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Is it not something to have the testimony of the law upon the right 
side ? Does law not sometimes go to make public opinion? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Would you not have law the highest standard of morals, rather than 
be accommodated to the existing condition of things? 

A. I would have a law passed as high as the moral standard of the com- 
munity would permit ; but I think that any law which is so far beyond the 
moral standard of the mass of the community as to be set at defiance tends to 
bring all law into discredit and to weaken its force. 

Q. Do you think that this law is in advance of the public sentiment in the 
country towns ? 

A. I very seldom go into the country towns, and would not undertake to 
answer that. 

Q. What facts show what public sentiment is ? For instance, we have 
had this prohibitory law on the statute book for fifteen years, and it has every 
year been brought into politics, and has been sustained by the people ; is that 
not an evidence that it does express the public sentiment of the community ? 

A. If the existence of the law for fifteen years shows that it met with the 
approbation of legislators, the open defiance of it in the community shows 
that it has not its effect upon the majority of the people. 

Q. Is the open defiance of the law universal throughout the State, or is it 
limited to certain cities ? 

A. Well, sir, I do not know what you would call defiance of it. For my 
part, I am willing to own that within a week I went and purchased some wine 
for an invalid. I did not go to the State nor to the town agent ; I went 
where I chose. If that was a defiance of the law, I felt perfectly innocent in 
doing it. 

Q. But here is an evil that produces three-fourths of the pauperism and 
crime in the community, besides domestic evils of every possible kind ; and 
the State, in its judgment, has passed a law prohibiting the sale of liquor for 
drinking as a beverage, but providing a way whereby those who need 
ardent spirits for medicinal purposes, or who need it in the arts, can procure 
them according to law ; now allow me to ask you whether, upon the whole, it 
is not the part of a good citizen to conform to that law ? 

A. Morally, I should say that it was; but I should also say that all that 
the law had to ••do was to suppress intemperance. I am, both by precept and 
example, opposed to everything like intemperance, and would not coun- 
tenance it in any one, but I feel that the law has no right to infringe upon my 



APPENDIX. 279 

personal liberty in such a case as that, as it is neither a matter of temperance 
or intemperance. 

Q. We all have different opinions about that ; one man thinks that a cer- 
tain law is an infringement upon his personal liberty, an unreasonable and 
unconstitutional infringement; another thinks that it is not. We, of course, 
have to live under the laws, and we live under a constitution in which our 
rights are defined. Here is a law which is like almost all other laws upon the 
subject in one respect: it does, to a certain extent, curtail the liberties of the 
people ; all laws upon this subject do ; but, under the constitution, the ques- 
tion of whether it does or not violate the private rights of individuals, has time 
and time again been brought before the highest court of the Commonwealth, 
and it has been decided over and over again that the law docs not infringe the 
rights of the people, and that the Legislature has a constitutional right to pass 
such a law, and to enforce it. Now, I ask, is it not the part of a good citizen 
to bow to that law ? 

A. As a general thing I should say that it was, but not without exception. 
I understand that the law allows an alternative to every man, — he can either 
obey the law, or suffer the penalty of its violation. In the case of the Fugitive 
Slave Law, I made up my mind that I should, under no circumstance, obey 
the law, but would take the penalty. 

Q. I understood you to say that you were in favor of a license law, 
although license laws have been inoperative ? 

A. I think, as I have said, that law has the right to interfere with the sale 
of liquors where the consequences of that sale entail burdens or risks upon the 
community. If any man has the sagacity and wisdom to discern and to define 
it, I think it will be found to mark the point of legislation. 

Q. Your great feeling is in regard to personal rights. You are in favor of 
a license law, but a license which would probably give to but one man in five 
hundred the right to sell. Is that not an infringement upon the personal 
right of every one who desires to sell who does not get that exclusive 
privilege ? 

A. I suppose that it is. I did not speak of any limits, within which I 
would confine a license law, whether to one in five hundred, or one in five 
thousand. 

Q. Your license law is supposed to give a license to some and to prohibit 
others from selling ; if everybody is permitted to sell there is no license 
about it. A license is a privilege. I want to know, then, if a license law is 
not an infringement upon the rights of those who want a license but cannot 
get it ? 

A. I suppose it is. 

Q. Then a license law is liable to the same objection as a prohibitory law ? 

A. It is liable to the same difficulty that besets all legislation that attempts 
to do by law what is to be done by morals. 

Q. The question here is between those who are in favor of a prohibitory 
law, and those who are in favor of a license law. Would you dispense with 
all law because it is difficult to enforce ? 

A. I would not dispense with all laws against intemperance, any more 
than I would dispense with laws against gambling or sensuality, but I should 



280 APPENDIX. 

not look to the law to do what many of the community expect from law ; men 
expect too much from the law. 

Testimony of Prof. Louis Agassiz. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long have you been a resident of the 
United States '? 

A. A little over twenty years. 

Q. You are a native of Switzerland ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When did you leave Switzerland, as your home ? 

A. At the time I came here. 

Q. Have you since re-visitcd Europe ? 

A. In 1859 I spent three months away from Cambridge, and in Europe. 

Q. As a native and a resident of Switzerland, had you any opportunity 
of observing, or any connection with the culture of the vine ? 

A. I was born and bred in a country in which wine-making is the princi- 
pal branch of agriculture. 

Q. Had you an opportunity of observing the culture of the vine and the 
making of wine ? 

A. Yes, sir. My father owned extensive vineyards as did also my sisters. 
I have seen the operation, just as you see farming in this country. 

Q. Was wine manufactured by the people ? 

A. Yes, sir. Every one who owned a bit of vineyard, made his own 
wine. 

Q. Had your father a profession ? 

A. He was a clergyman. 

Q. How extensive, and how constant, is the use of wine, as a beverage, 
among the people of Switzerland ? 

A. It is the usual beverage. It is a part of the alimentation of the 
country. It is so completely a part of the alimentation of the people, that 
anybody who is not able to supply himself with it is considered as a pauper, 
and deserves to be supplied with it. Wine is given as one of the charities 
extended to the poor of the country, and the pauper who comes destitute to 
the clergyman's door receives meat and wine. 

Q. Then it is as much used as any beverage is used in any country, and 
also as the food of the people ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What observations did you make, as a European, born, bred and 
educated in Europe, of the moral and physical effect, if any, produced upon 
the people by this alimentative use of wine ? 

A. I do not know of a more cheerful population, nor of a more temperate 
and steady class of people, than are the peasantry and the citizens generally 
of Switzerland. I believe that the use of the natural product of the grape, 
without the addition of alcohol, which is entirely unknown in wine-making 
countries, is one of the conditions which secures that cheerful disposition of 
the people, which is the characteristic of the inhabitants of the warmer part 
of Europe. 

Q. Have your observations extended to the neighboring countries ? 



APPENDIX. 281 

A. Yes, sir ; I spent eleven years as a student in German universities and 
in France, and have had opportunities to become familiar with the mode of 
living, the diet and the habits of the people ; and I believe that there is an 
acknowledged difference, which is a characterizing feature of the population of 
those parts of Germany where the use of beer is common, as compared with those 
parts of the same country where the use of wine is common, and as contrasted 
with those parts of Europe where the use of distilled liquors takes the place of 
the ordinary use of wine. The peasant of Bavaria lives upon beer and bread 
and a small quantity of meat ; but the principal food of the inhabitants of 
Southern Germany is beer and bread. The effect of such a diet is, perhaps, 
a greater disposition to dullness than is observed in those countries where 
wine is a part of the alimentation. When I speak of wine' as a part of the 
alimentation, I wish to be understood that it is actually so. There are 
portions of France, and some parts of Switzerland where bread and wine 
constitute the food of the people. In the liquor-drinking parts of Europe we 
find intemperance, but intemperance is unknown in the wine-growing coun- 
tries. It was when I went to England, for the first time in 1834, that I 
learned what drunkenness was. In England and in Northern Europe intem- 
perance is at home, but is unknown in other parts of Europe where the grape 
is grown. I hail with joy — for I am a temperance man and a friend of tem- 
perance — I hail with joy the efforts that are being made to raise wine in this 
country, and I wish them all success. I believe that when you can have 
everywhere cheap, pure, unadulterated wine, that you will no longer have 
need of either prohibitory or license laws. 

Q. If I understand you correctly, the use of such wines does not engender 
any morbid appetite, resulting in drunkenness ? 

A. I have never seen any morbid appetite engendered from the use of 
pure wine, any more than the using of other food engenders a morbid appetite 
for more food, or for food that is injurious. 

Q. As a European born resident of the United States 

A. Not a " resident," a citizen. 

Q. Excuse me. As a European born citizen of the United States, has 
your attention been called to the effect produced upon those who come from 
the old country to this, by prohibitory legislation ? 

A. I will speak of myself only* I was amazed to see the manner in which 
prohibitory legislation here interferes with the diet and mode of living of the 
people. Such an interference is entirely unknown to a European. I think 
that the effect is an injurious one ; and I perceived, very early in my residence 
in the United States, that there were a great many people who shared my 
opinion and my feeling about the use of pure wine, but who were led by the 
pressure of the sentiment of the community to publicly express opinions very 
different from those they really entertained, and who practised in private what 
they denounced in public. 

Q. Have you ever considered whether this country affords facilities for the 
culture of the grape and the production of wine, wherewith to meet the want 
you have described ? 

A. I have no doubt of it. In the States of Ohio, Missouri and California, 
wines of excellent quality are now produced, and which, I trust, one of these 
86 



282 APPENDIX. 

days will be produced to a sufficient extent to be exported abroad, and 
become a profitable part not only of our agriculture but of our commerce. 

Q. You think, then, that the use of the fruit of the vine would tend to 
the moral and physical welfare of the people ? 

A. I believe that it would. I know that in some parts of Europe, where 
intemperance from the use of distilled spirits had become very extensive, that 
the remedy proposed was the production of fermented liquors at as cheap a 
rate as possible, and their distribution freely among the poorer classes by 
incorporated benevolent societies. I know that in Norway, in Sweden and in 
Denmark, the distribution at low prices of good qualities of fermented 
liquors, under the agency of temperance societies, as a remedy for intemper- 
ance, was attempted. 

Q. With what result ? 

A. With very satisfactory results. I know it from good sources — from the 
the late physician to the King of Sweden and from the late Professor of 
Physiology in the University of Copenhagen. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You spoke of wine being used as a part of the alimen- 
tation in the wine-growing countries of Europe ; I desire to inquire whether 
the alcohol produced in wine by fermentation bears any part whatsoever in 
the process of alimentation ? 

A. I understand what you aim at. I will answer that this question is 
under investigation among experimental physiologists, but that the result of 
their investigations are contradictory. I have not myself worked in that 
direction in my scientific researches, so that I have no positive information to 
give, but I believe that the alcohol which is found by chemical analysis in 
wine that has been produced by fermentation, is so combined with the mass of 
the fluid as to form an integral part of it. Hydrogen is a part of water, but 
you do not drink hydrogen and oxygen when you drink water ; so when you 
drink wine you do not drink a mixture of something with alcohol, but you 
drink wine. 

Q. Do you mean to say, as a chemist, that the alcohol is in chemical 
combination in the wine ? 

A. I mean to say that the alcohol is in such a combination in the wine 
that a mixture of a certain amount of alcohol with water, even when com- 
bined with sugar and flavored with other things, will have a very different 
effect from the wine produced by fermentation, otherwise wine could be 
manufactured which would have the seme effect as natural wine. But I am 
no chemist, and I do not choose to answer chemical questions. 

Q. I desire you to say whether the same nutritive elements may not be 
found in solid food, and used in that form, with all the beneficial effects 
derived from the use of wine ? 

A. Just as much as you might find the nutritive elements of meat in any 
preparation which the chemist might make, but you would not, therefore, 
drive out the use of butchered meat because that is more palatable, more 
easily obtained and more natural. 

Q. Have you, of your own knowledge, any ground for denying the conclu- 
sions of the physiologists of France, in their experiments of alcohol taken 
into the human system ? 



APPENDIX. 283 

A. I have told you that I was not a chemist, nor an experimental physiolo- 
gist, and I am in the habit of giving evidence in science only upon those 
things which I know. I can, therefore, only answer you by saying that I do 
not know. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) You have been in a great many parts of the world, 
and I should like to ask you if you have ever been at a hotel where you have 
not been able to obtain wine or liquor ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When was that ? 

A. Last week. 

Q. Where? 

A. In -New York — at the Everett House. 

Q. On what day was that ? 

A. On Sunday. 

Q. With that exception you have been able to obtain it ? 

A. When I am travelling I make it a rule not to live differently from the 
people with whom I am, so that, although at home, I use wine every day, 
when I am travelling I abstain from the use of it, because I do not want to 
live differently from the people with whom I associate in public. 

Q. Do you know of any hotels except the one in New York, which you 
have mentioned, where wines and liquors cannot be had? 

A . I do not ; but I have not had opportunities of obtaining information 
in regard to that matter. 

Q. You have been in a great many of the cities of this country, and also 
of England, France and Germany, and have stopped, I. suppose, at first-class 
hotels ; I ask whether or not, so far as your observation extends, guests at 
hotels have facilities for obtaining wines and liquors, if they desire ? 

A. I have never asked for those things which I knew were not furnished 
legally. When I have been out West I have generally refrained from 
inquiry. I was so occupied with my own objects that I hardly ever made 
inquiries upon that subject. The whole subject was an objectionable one to 
me ; I have observed so much duplicity in regard to the subject, — so much 
difference between public profession and private practice, that the whole 
question has become so unpleasant that I have generally abstained from 
making any inquiries. 

Q. (By Mr. MgClellan - .) Is the wine obtained in this country similar 
to that obtained in European countries*? 

A. You may obtain wines similar to those used in Europe, but generally 
they are adulterated by the addition of alcohol which makes them very disa- 
greeable. There is a prevalent opinion that imported wines, even the lighter 
qualities, such as champagne, in order to stand the voyage, must be mixed 
with alcohol, which makes them objectionable. In Europe it is the custom to 
drink them pure. 

Q. Are wines generally enforced with alcohol ? 

A. I believe they are, unless in a private house where a gentleman 
chooses to have them as they are manufactured. That is the way I use them 
myself. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) With what classes have you mingled in this country ? 



284 APPENDIX. 

A. With all classes. Generally, when I make an excursion it is for the 
purpose of lecturing. I am usually received by the notables of a place, but 
the next day I go to the school-houses, to see the schools and the teachers, and 
through them I am brought in contact with the parents and children. 

Q. I will inquire of you whether you find this hypocrisy, which is so dis- 
tasteful to you, among all classes, or among the notables who receive you in 
the respective places ? 

A. As I have already stated, this subject is one that I have rather shunned 
than otherwise. 

Q. Have those people of whom you have been a guest for a time, been so 
unkind as to thrust their duplicity upon you ? 

A. I have not charged the community at large with duplicity, and I do 
not think your question bears upon my experience. I have observed here and 
in other large cities, that there is a great difference between the public 
profession of men and their private practice. 

Q. Is this true of those with whom you mingle in this city and community? 

A. Of course I cannot speak of those with whom I do not mingle ; but I 
have mingled with men of all classes here in Boston as well as in other parts 
of the country. I have not said that all with whom I meet are guilty of 
duplicity ; I would not wish to be represented as having said that all the men 
I have met with were guilty of duplicity ; but I have met with a great many 
people who, in the matter of drinking, do not practise in private what they 
profess in public. I will give an incident that will illustrate what I mean. 
Not long ago, a clergyman of the highest respectability told me that he could 
not perform his duties without sustaining his system by an occasional glass of 
wine ; and he added that " such was the prejudice of the country that he dare 
not let it be known for fear of losing his influence." 

Q. I have no doubt of the truth of the illustration. Such clergymen no 
doubt are to be found. 

A. The prejudices of the community are so great, that in self-defenee, a 
man in his position cannot own up what he does. I own up to the fact that I 
drink wine every day. 

Testimony of Rev. Rollin H. Neale, D. D. 

Q, (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside, and what is your calling ? 

A. I reside in Boston, and am knqwn as a clergyman. 

Q. Of what church? 

A. The First Baptist Church of this city. 

Q. How long have you resided in Boston ? 

A. I have been pastor of that church for thirty years. I have been in 
Boston several years longer than that. 

Q. What observations have you been able to make, and to what con- 
clusions have you come, as to the effect of the present prohibitory law ? 

A. I must say that I am obliged to accord with the testimory that I have 
heard, that there seems to be an increase in intemperance, and a strong 
disposition to oppose the law. Whether such opposition has been owing to 
the dislike of coercion or not, I cannot say, and I cannot see that there has 
been much actual coercion. I am afraid that there has not been. The 



APPENDIX. 285 

State Constabulary is doing a pretty active work, and, so far as I can judge, 
a successful one. I think it very desirable that whatever laws are enacted 
upon the subject should be carried into effect, if possible. Whether it be 
practicable to carry into effect the present law, I do not consider myself 
competent to judge. I have conversed with different officers of the City 
Police, with the Mayor, and with men whose business it was to execute the 
laws, who say that it would be utterly impracticable, and I have no other 
means of forming an opinion than from their remarks concerning the law. 

Q. As a matter of fact, within your own observation, how is the cause of 
temperance now, as compared with what it was fifteen or twenty years ago ? 

A. I should hope that public opinion upon the subject of temperance had 
risen to a higher tone, but whether it has been efficient in preventing the 
spread of intemperance or not, I cannot tell. I have no doubt whatever that 
the agitation of the subject has tended to strengthen the reform. 

Q. What is your opinion, formed from your own observation in the 
sphere of your labors, of the comparative expediency of the present pro- 
hibitory law, and some law that would permit the sale of liquors under proper 
restrictions ? 

A. I confess that I am more ignorant of the law than perhaps I ought to 
be, but I have an idea that as strong a law as can be carried into effect, is 
desirable. I cannot judge so well as others who have more to do with law, 
which is best, but I have no question, as a clergyman, (and, I think, an earnest 
friend of temperance in every respect,) that, while the most stringent laws 
that can be enforced should be made, I would have stringent laws regulating 
the sale of intoxicating liquors, for, I suppose, no one goes in for entire prohi- 
bition. I am mistaken in the nature of the prohibitory law if entire prohibi- 
tion is its object. 

Q. What is your opinion of the expediency of a law prohibiting the sale 
of intoxicating liquors, wine, cider and beer as a beverage ? 

A. So far as such a law could be carried into effect, I should certainly 
favor it. 

Q. Have you had occasion to travel abroad, and to notice the operations 
of intemperance there ? 

A. I have several times been abroad in different countries ; I have had 
occasion to observe, as a traveller passing rapidly from one country to another, 
the habits of the people, both in France and in Germany, where in the one 
case they drink wine habitually, and in the other beer, and in large quanti- 
ties, yet I scarcely ever saw one drunk, though all seemed to be under its 
influence, and very lively. They undoubtedly drank to excess, especially in 
Germany, but there was not so much absolute drunkenness as we see in Eng- 
land and in this country. My observations, of course, were limited. 

Testimony of Kev. Thomas Worcester, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are a resident of Boston ? 
A. I am. 

Q. How. long have you been in the Christian ministry ? 
A. I was invited tosettle in Boston in the year 1821. I accepted the invita- 
tion in May of that year, and have been in the ministry ever since. 



286 APPENDIX. 

Q. Of what church ? 

A. Gf the New Jerusalem Church in Bowdoin Street. 

Q. In your capacity as a Christian minister, and as a general observer of 
society, have you ever formed any opinion as to the value, the moral value, of 
an attempt to coerce men into temperance by legal restraints on the sale of 
intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I have had an opinion upon the subject ever since the attempt was 
made. My opinion is that the attempt was a mistake, although well meant. 
I do not think that the law is calculated to have a good tendency. I do not 
think that it really tends to promote temperance. It may, in appearance, 
suppress intemperance; it may drive it into secret places, but I do not think 
that it really tends to suppress it. 

Q. As to the question of conformity to sound principles of morals and 
of religion, as revealed to us in the gospels, what is your judgment ? 

A. It does not seem to me, in its mode of operation, to conform to the 
principles of the gospel. I know nothing in the gospels, either in the New 
Testament or in the Old, that will countenance prohibitory legislation. 

Q. And as a matter of practice, you think that it is working ill ? 

A. As to that, I have but little knowledge of my own. My situation has 
been such that I have had but little personal observation upon the subject. 
The most that I know about it, I have learned from other people ; I hear 
what they say, and I read what they print. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do I understand you to lay down the doctrine 
that prohibitory legislation is not in harmony with the gospel ? 

A. I do not think that it is. 

Q. Do you mean prohibitory legislation, as a general principle ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. What do you mean ? 

A. I mean prohibitory legislation in this case. 

Q. Are there other cases in which it is in harmony ? 

A. Certainly; in my opinion there are cases in which prohibitory legis- 
lation is proper. 

Q. Will you please state your objection to prohibitory legislation in this 
case, as compared with that in the case of gambling ? 

A. I do not know whether I could state it as compared with gambling. 
Ascending to my own knowledge, I have no reason to think that intoxicating 
liquors are, in themselves, vices. I believe that depends upon the use we 
make of them. I believe that we are so constituted in this life that we may 
have good things presented to us which we need to use with care, and which, 
if not used with care, may become injurious to us. I believe that intoxicating 
liquors are among those things that need ta be used with care, — a great deal 
of care. I believe that some regulation in regard to their use may be needed i 
but what that regulation should be, I have not knowledge enough of legisla- 
tion to say. 

Q. Can there be any legislation upon the subject that will not involve the 
principle of prohibition, — that will not prohibit somebody from selling ? 

A. No, sir, I suppose not. 



APPENDIX. 287 

Q. You would, then, have a regulation that would prohibit somebody from 
selling; would not such a law violate your principle ? 

A. No, sir. I think that there should be some regulation in the matter. 
I do not think that it should be entirely free, like other things that are not 
liable to be abused. 

Q. Where would you draw the line ? 

A. Perhaps I cannot ; I would not undertake to draw it strictly. 
Q. But your regulation would say that certain persons might sell it under 
certain circumstances, and that all others should not sell it ? 
A. That is probably so. 

Q. Then, for instance, you would prohibit ninety-nine out of a hundred, 
and allow one to sell. Would it not be wrong to prohibit the ninety-nine 
from doing that which you would allow one to do ? 

A. I think that it is right to allow some to sell, but wrong to allow every- 
body. 

Q. You know that our law provides that certain persons may sell it for 
medicines, and for the arts ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Can you see a better law than that ? 

A. I think so; I think there ought to be more liberty. I think that 
people, generally, ought to have an opportunity to purchase it, — to obtain 
ardent spirits. 1 think it rests with them whether they should abuse the 
privilege or not. 

Q. I look upon your doctrine of prohibition as somewhat inconsistent. I 
do not see how you can prohibit a vast majority consistently with your 
doctrine of non-prohibition ? 

A. My principle of non-prohibition is this: — that intoxicating liquors 
should not be totally prohibited, but I believe that it is the right of the Legis- 
lature to make laws by which some persons shall have the right to sell, and by 
which others shall not. 

Q. Will you please give me your ideas of the practise of total abstinence 
from intoxicating liquors as a beverage. Do you believe in it ? 

A. I do not believe in it as a principle. I believe in it practically. It 
has been my practice nearly the whole of my life, and I am glad to have 
other people abstain. I like the notion, but I would not take a pledge. I 
would not vote for a law that would require it. I would be in freedom. 

Q. Your idea of the license law would be to put the sale of liquor into the 
hands of those with whom it would be safe, and prohibit it to all others ? 

A. Yes, sir ; that is, so far as I have formed any idea about it. I know 
out very little about legislation. 
Q. You came to Boston in 1821 ? 
A, Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you know what laws were in operation then ? 
A. I really do not. I should not think any law was in operation at that 
time. From my own observation the evils of drunkenness were visible every- 
where. You could not cross the Common any time of the day without seeing 
a half dozen drunken people lying flat upon their backs, and you could not 
walk the streets without seeing drunken people. 



288 APPENDIX. 

Q. Is it as bad as that now ? 

.1. No, sir. 

(^. Do you not know that that state of things was under a stringent license 
law ? 

A. No, sir, I do not Perhaps I have'known it, but if I ever did, I have 
forgotten it. If the law was stringent in its terms, in its execution it was not 
stringent at all. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Any movement which you may have observed 
in the morals of society, do you ascribe to law, or to other influences, and if 
to other influences, what are they ? 

4« I am not sure but some good has resulted from the laws that have 
been enacted, but I would not recommend any of those means, because I 
think that when we resort to legal means the whole community is apt to 
neglect the better means. 

Q. (By Mr. MlNER.) In your judgment is the existence of law a barrier 
to the use of better and moral means ? 

A. I think that it is to a considerable extent. 

Q. Still you think those better means, have in fact been employed and 
have been greatly successful in changing the aspect of society ? 

A. I have lamented the existence of legal means all the time, because I 
have felt that they were the means of preventing the use of other influences. 

Q. That is not an answer to the question. I ask you whether, in tact, 
you have not found that moral means, notwithstanding the law, have improved 
the state of society ? 

A, Well, sir, 1 do not know. I cannot say whether they have in that 
particular respect. I do not think that moral means have been used to so 
great an extent as they would have been if legal means had not been so rife. 

Q. But still moral means have been used to some extent ? 

A. Certainly, to my knowledge, they have been used to some extent. 

Testimony op Rev. George Putnam, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long have you lived in Koxbury ? 

A, Thirty-seven years. 

Q. You have always been a clergyman, and settled in Roxbury ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. "Will you be kind enough to state whether you have formed any 
opinion, in the pursuit of the ministry and as an observer oi' society, oi' the 
ellect produced by attempts to coerce men into morality and temperance by 
means of prohibitory laws ? 

A* I have not seen any satisfactory evidence that the attempt to suppress 
the use of liquor is a success or that it is likely to be a success. I am not 
aware that intemperance has been diminished of late. I think there is now 
more of what is called moderate drinking in the community, so far as comes 
under my observation, than there was twenty or thirty years ago. The tem- 
perance movement at that time had diminished the use of intoxicating drinks 
to a considerable extent. But it was not altogether a sound result that was 
then produced. There was a good deal of the coercion of public opinion in 
those days, a great deal of hypocrisy — duplicity, as it has been called. Many 



APPENDIX. 289 

persons were urged, almost forced into signing the pledge of total abstinence 
It was made lions not to favor the temperance movement; but that move- 
ment did, I think, produce a large diminution in drinking. I think there has 
since been a considerable reaction from that result. I do not know that 
there is now any more intemperance than then, but there is more moderate 
drinking. I suppose that any law to suppress it entirely not only fails, but, in 
the very nature of things, cannot succeed, and can only approximate to a 
suppression, l'erhaps my conclusions are founded more upon what I consider 
the law of things than upon any close observation, or exact information. 

The desire, or appetite, or whatever you may call it, for tonics of a stimu- 
lative nature, is so extensive in this community, and in every community, and 
in all ages of the world ; the articles which supply that want are so nearly a 
product of nature, or produced by very simple processes from a great many 
natural products; then there are so many persons everywhere who believe 
that their use is innocent and healthful; so many persons, not merely those 
who are given over to their appetites, -or who are intemperate, but a great 
many of the best men in the community, and the best men I know of, do 
believe that it is good for them ; and at the same time, there being a great 
interest in the matter as a property question — all these tilings lead me to the 
conclusion, that even an approximate suppression of the use of intoxicating 
liquors, however desirable it may be, can never be attained. I suppose 
that it is a matter of fact to-day (as it has been every day since I was born, 
and will be every day hereafter,) that anybody who determines to have 
liquor to drink will get it somehow, and from somewhere. That being my 
conclusion, I next looked to see whether its sale and use could be regulated — 
whether it could be so regulated as to produce fewer of the evils that result 
in so many cases from the use. On that point, I have no definite opinion. 
1 am not a legislator. I suppose public opinion would sustain a pretty rigid 
system of restriction ; not an attempt to prevent the sale altogether, but to 
restrict and limit the sale. I have no theory as to the measures that should be 
adopted ; but the more restrictions that public opinion will sustain, the better 
But public opinion, I think, docs not, and never will sustain entire prohibi- 
tion. A large majority of the people of the Commonwealth might vote for 
it, but it is not enough to have a majority to enforce a criminal law. So long- 
as there is a large minority, — and that minority includes some of the wisest, 
and best, and most respectable citizens — so long will the breakers of the law 
feel that they have somebody to support them. In this case there is not a 
public opinion that permits the suppression. My profession naturally feel the 
evils that result from ineffectual legislation. I believe that the present law 
produces a demoralization, not gross and obvious like that produced by intem- 
perance, but a disrespect for law that cannot be enforced. It demoralizes 
jurors and witnesses. It demoralizes the sellers of liquor, inducing them to 
resort to all manner of frauds, and evasions, and tricks, to do that unlawfully 
which they cannot do lawfully. It is injurious to the consciences of the peo- 
ple to be always violating a law. I am not familiar with the courts of law, 
but I suppose that constant litigation upon the subject in the courts must 
produce ill-feeling and unkindness. 
37 



290 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooler.) You believe that a license law, by restricting the 
traffic, would diminish and restrain the evils of intemperance ?. 

A. I suppose that that would be expected. 

Q. I understand you to express your opinion of the present law more as a 
philosophical deduction than as a conclusion drawn from actual facts that 
have come within your own observation ? 

A. I cannot exclude either. I suppose that I have some general knowl- 
edge of the facts without any minute investigation, and I dare say that my 
investigations as to the facts influenced my theoretical conclusions. I cannot 
separate them entirely. 

Q. Ycu live near Boston ? 

A. ldo. 

Q. Have you been accustomed to go around in the country towns of 
Massachusetts and observe the operations of the law there ? 

A. Very little. 

Q. Have you had information that you considered reliable ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. If you should see in the country towns this law practically in effect, 
and intemperance driven out by it, would you not consider that a pretty good 
effect ? 

A. That is a supposition that I cannot answer. I have not seen intemper- 
ance anywhere suppressed. I sometimes go into small country towns in 
Massachusetts, but I am not in the way to see much of the habits of the people, 
but I am informed that even in the country those who insist upon having 
liquor find it. 

Q. " Those who insist upon it." You have laid it down as what you sup- 
posed an acknowledged fact that a man who was determined to have liquor, 
could get it. Do you not think that if cheap wines were here where every- 
body could get at them handily, about everybody would drink ? 

A. I think very probably they would. I supposed that the extensive 
drinking of wines did not prevail much in climes so far north ; but I cannot 
say. 

Q. You suppose the people would pretty generally drink under such 
circumstances ? 

A. I suppose so. 

Q. Did you ever see anybody who was determined to have a glass of pure 
wine? 

A. I have seen people who were particular about it. 

Q. Is there one man in five hundred that is determined to have a bottle 
of pure wine ? 

A. Taking the whole community, I suppose that there is not. 

Q. Is not the reason that they arc not determined, because they cannot 
get it? 

A. I presume the majority do not know whether the wine they use is pure 
or not. They probably would not know the difference between the pure and 
an adulterated article. 

Q. People do not form a determination to do that which they know it 
impossible to do ? 



APPENDIX. 291 

A. No, sir. 

Q. And when it is impossible to do a thing, the determination is not 
formed — is that not true ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Then if we can suppress the sale of liquor by legislation, people would 
not get it nor determine to get it ? 

A. Hardly; supposing that to be done, which I previously supposed 
impossible. 

Q. But you can suppose both sides ? 

A. Yes, sir. I suppose that if it was entirely suppressed, people after 
a while would cease to think anything about it. 

Q. Do you not know that in certain countries of the world the sale has 
been suppressed, and intoxicating drinks excluded from the country ? 

A. I was not aware of that fact. 

Q. Did you not know that it was done in Japan ? 

A. I did not. 

Q. Nor in Turkey ? 

A. I did not. 

Mr. Andrew. They never were. 

Mr. Spooner. Do they exist in Japan? 

Mr. Andrew. I do not know. 

Mr. Spooner. I am endeavoring to show that the determination to use 
intoxicating drinks would not be formed, if it was impossible to gratify the 
desire. 

Q. Have you been accustomed to travel much in the West ? 

A. Not at all. 

Q. Are you aware that there is more liquor drank in the Western States, 
than in States where they have licenses ? 

A. I have an idea that whiskey is more freely drank out West then at the 
East, but I am not acquainted with the facts. 

Q. You have lived in Roxbury nearly forty years ? You lived there for 
a while under the operation of the license law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 
1 Q. How did that license law operate ? 

1 A. I do not know; I never had occasion to visit any of the places that 
were licensed, but so far as the drinking habits of the community were con- 
cerned, I should never have known that the law had ever been changed. 
There is nothing to bring that law home to me. I only know that the law is 
changed by the everlasting jangling of the political machinery that I hear in 
every election ; but, so far as liquor-drinking is concerned, I should not know 
that there was any change in the law. 

Q. It is claimed that a license law will greatly restrain the sale of liquor ; 
I want to know if you remember when the license law was in existence, 
whether it was enforced against the unlicensed ? 

A. I do not know, sir. 

Q. Is your memory like Dr. Worcester's, as to the amount of intemperance 
at that time ? The Doctor said that men were then to be seen every day 
lying drunk on the Common. 



292 APPENDIX. 

A. I have no such distinct recollection. Now and then I see a drunken 
man in my walks ; and I do not remember the time when I did not. 

Q. Do you see drunken men as frequently as you did thirty -five years 
ago? 

A. I am not aware of any difference. My general impression is that 
there is a difference, and a favorable difference. 

Q. Have you ever heard, or have you any decided opinion, as to whether 
the attempt had ever been made to enforce this law in the city of Boston, 
until the State Police took hold of the matter ? 

A. I only know what I have heard. 

Q What is your opinion about it ? 

A. That the city authorities have believed it impossible to enforce the 
law, and that it has not been enforced. I believe now that it is enforced only 
here and there. I believe that when you stop the sale in one place, it breaks 
out in another ; that where the open sale is prevented, the secret sale will 
take the place, of the open. I suppose that while there is a demand for liquor, 
there will be a supply in spite of the law. 

Q. Do you suppose there are as many selling now as there were a few 
years ago ? 

A. I have no means of knowing. 

Q. Have you seen the statistics upon the subject ? 

A. I have not studied them carefully, and know nothing about them. 

Testimony of Rev. JosEni Tracy, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. My residence is in Beverly : my office is in Boston. 

Q. What has been your professional calling ? 

A. I was ordained to the ministry about 1820. 

Q. What denomination ? 

A. Congregational. 

Q. Orthodox ? 

A. I pass for orthodox, always. I was pastor in Vermont for eight or nine 
years. Then, called by the authority of the general convention of the minis- 
ters of this State, I became the editor of their paper. 

Q. A religious paper ? 

A. Yes, sir ; established by their action. I have been called from one 
thing to another ever since. 

Q. How long did you remain there ? 

A. About half a dozen years ; then I was called by a similar action to 
Boston to take charge of the " Boston Recorder." Afterwards I edited the 
" New York Observer " for a while ; and have attended to various other 
things. 

Q. I would inquire, in view of your observation, what conclusion you have 
arrived at in regard to the present system of prohibitory legislation in relation 
to preventing the use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I suppose, sir, that all our laws ever since my remembrance, and long 
before, have been prohibitory, properly speaking, prohibiting the sale except 
by certain persons designated by public authority and regulations used by 



APPENDIX. 293 

public authority ; and I suppose that is the case now. It seems to me that we 
are victims of a sophism here, in the sharp contrast between a prohibitory 
system and a license system ; for the license systems have all been prohibitory. 
My impression is that a system which is prohibitory to the extent of prohib- 
iting all who are not designated and authorized by the public authority is 
beneficial, though if any one chooses to say that throwing open the sale to 
everybody that chooses to sell is a right, I could not call him a fool, without 
examination of the question. 

Q. How is it in regard to the prohibition under the present law ? 

A. I cannot speak from my own observation to any considerable extent. 
My impression is that the form of effort for the promotion of temperance in 
which I engaged about the year 1826 or '27, was the most efficient that there 
has been. Perhaps it is from my prejudice, but I think that those of us who 
engaged in it then, made greater progress, more increase of effort, and better 
efforts than have been made since there was a varying from that course ; and 
that there was a great falling off when that kind of effort, by persuading indi- 
viduals to be temperate, was superseded by calling everybody from that work 
by taking it into the hands of the law. The question I perceive has been 
asked whether coercion by law is better than moral effort. I think it is not 
better, but it is an excuse for neglecting it ; and I suppose that the various 
improvements of the laws which I have witnessed, have most of them been 
introduced mainly in order to get rid of so much hard work, and get the State 
to do it for them ; and it has been a great mistake. 

Q. Have you any opinion in regard to the theory of criminal law for 
enforcing moral conduct, like that which is desired to be brought about upon 
the people who become intemperate. 

A . I do not know how I ought to answer that question. I suppose tem- 
perance as enjoined in the Holy Scriptures, is a voluntary thing. The word 
means self-control, and not merely confinement to a certain course or condi- 
tion by an external force. I know that there are occasions in which men 
must be confined by external force, and that when and how far is a matter of 
legislative discretion. It must be done as the public good requires, but there 
is no virtue in being chained up in walls, or in any other way restrained by an 
external force. The moral goodness consists in one's sustaining one's self. 

Q. Is there such a thing as good for the sake of others ? 

A. There is a question for legislators; and I have no doubt there is a 
necessity for it, so far as it will promote the public good ; but where the State 
is obliged to take away the right to do good voluntarily, it is a misfortune. 
The man would be a better man if he would do it without compulsion. 

Q. Is it at all in your opinion, the tendency of such legislation to reform 
men whom it restrains. 

A. I cannot say that I think it is. The legislation that reforms men by 
an external force may keep them from doing bad things when they cannot, 
and that seems to me to be all the good ; the moment that they get out of its 
reach, they are just as bad, and more likely worse. 

Q. That state of society may be necessary, but does not produce reform ? 

A. It may restrain men, but does not reform. 



294 APPENDIX. 

Q. Your opinion as to the effect of this legislation — I mean the present 
prohibitory law — as an obstacle or otherwise to the successful prosecution of 
what you would believe to be proper temperance measures ? 

A. I do not know whether I would say obstacle; if not, it would be from 
doubt about the definition of the word obstacle. I think that the present 
course of legislation has had the effect of diminishing the amount of right 
effort. It is what I should expect, from the nature of things and from what I 
have observed from the beginning. It diminishes, not by putting obstacles in 
the way of a man's exerting a moral influence for the law, but by promising 
to supersede his efforts and relieve him from the necessity of doing this duty. 
Most people are glad to be relieved from doing a laborious duty, especially 
one for which they will be laughed at and cursed. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have you observed what class of men have felt 
this exclusion from moral effort by reason of the prohibitory law, whether they 
were men in favor of temperance or of moderate use ? 

A. The term " moderate use " is now used for the first time, and I want to 
make a little explanation. The word temperance in the Bible is consistent 
with moderate use ; and, though it may imply sometimes total abstinence, it 
does not in this imply no use at all. I would say, that generally the influence 
of legislation has been to make all men feel this law a partial excuse from 
moral effort, and that this does not apply, so far as I have observed, to any 
one class. 

Q. Are you not aware that there were very active temperance associations 
in large numbers, and that uniformly, without scarcely an individual excep- 
tion, they sustain our present prohibitory law ? 

A. Certainly ; I am aware that the effort lias been turned very much from 
the moral effort to reform individuals, into something like a political effort. 

Q. Arc you not aware, for example, that the Sons of Temperance arc 
distinctly understood to exert their efforts to recover individuals, and yet that 
they are individually and collectively in favor of the present law ? 

A. I have heard of their efforts to recover individuals ; but I am not posted 
as to the statistics. 

Q. Then you are aware that there are bodies similar to the Sons of Tem- 
perance who have distinguished themselves for moral efforts ? 

A. I do not say "distinguished." I think that I should myself very 
much doubt whether, by taking the whole thing into their hands and excusing 
everybody, they do not do more hurt than good. 

Q. How does it follow that, because a body of men associate themselves 
together, they thereby excuse you or anybody else ? 

A. It follows from the perversencss of the human mind. 

Q. Then it applies equally to moral efforts, does it ? 

A. I do not know what efforts they have used, whether moral or economi- 
cal. I have heard something of their attempting to support their members 
when they are sick. I do not know that the effort has been a moral effort. 

Q. What right have any class of gentlemen, and especially of clergymen, 
on the enactment of a prohibitory law by other people, to say that they are 
therefore excused. If you believe that moral effort is the true mode of labor, 
what right have you to excuse yourself ? 



APPENDIX. 295 

A. No right at all, unless I see that circumstances are so changed by the 
law as to render my labors useless, or at least less useful. 

Q. Have your efforts been based on total abstinenco in your labors thus 
far? 

A. Yes, sir; total abstinence, as a beverage, and for purposes of convivi- 
ality. 

Q. Are there any places for open sale of liquor in Beverly ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Has there been, at any time, an application of the law in removing 
any person that had entered upon the sale there ? 

A. I think, within a few months, there has been a case of an Irish woman, 
near the boundary of Salem, whose liquors were taken and carried off. There 
was one place where it Avas reported that liquors could be had, and then it 
was reported that the man had been threatened and had quit. I do not know 
how it was. 

Q. Do you think it would have been better to have allowed the man to 
set up his shop, and then to have plied him with moral suasion ? Which is 
better, to rely on moral suasion alone or to make short work of it? 

A. If it was left to me, I should apply the law and shut him up. 

Q. In view of the existing facts in the city of Boston in the regular busi- 
ness traffic, and under an influence too strong to be counterbalanced by any 
influence of moral effort reasonably to be expected in such a community 
without the aid of law, would you not rely upon law ? 

A. I suppose so; and therefore I said in the beginning of my examina- 
tion that I would have selling prohibited, except to persons authorized by the 
State, who should sell under regulations. 

Q. You are a total abstainer ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Would you have them sell for purposes not conformable to the prin- 
ciples deduced from the influence of liquors as a beverage upon people in 
general ? That is, being a total abstainer from principle, would you have the 
State authorize their sale as a beverage ? 

A. There is a very considerable difficulty there. I would not, as that 
would be understood. There is a difficulty there, in the State's authorizing 
the sale by persons who shall determine what the purpose of a particular sale 
is. I would say that if it were uncertain, in any particular case, it would be 
well to stop the sale. 

Q. However, as a beverage, you would pronounce it improper ? 

A. I should ; but still I do not know that I should not allow the buyer to 
be very much his own judge as to whether he needed it or not. 

Testimony of Hon. Alfred Macy. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What is your residence ? 

A . Nantucket. 

Q. You are a member of the bar ? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q. Are you an officer of the town ? 

A. Not at the present time. 



296 APPENDIX. 

Q. You were formerly Collector of the port ? 

A. I was, until last October. 

Q. Are } r ou. aware of the preparation and sending to the General Court of 
a petition from the Island of Nantucket in favor of a license law ? 

A. I was called upon'and asked to sign, and did sign, such a petition. I 
had nothing to do, however, with its circulation, and have had but little 
knowledge in reference to its circulation ; but I have been informed by many 
of those persons, and I know that many of them are men regarded as first- 
class in our community. 

Q. Is it your opinion, then, as a matter of observation and theory that 
some such legislation would be favorable ? 

A. I should say that some such legislation would be desirable. I would 
not, however, restrict the present prohibitory law, but I would engraft upon 
that a license law. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Would it not reverse, practically, the operation 
of the present law ? 

A. It would, to a certain extent, reverse it ; but I would retain the pro- 
visions of the prohibitory law, for the purpose of checking the illegal sale of 
intoxicating liquors. I would have a license law, but I would have that 
license law so framed that the city or town authorities might control the 
matter, each in their own town or city ; and then I would retain the provisions 
of the present prohibitory law, and enable them to control the matter, each 
in their own towns. 

Q. Is this view based on any difficulty in executing the present law ? 

A. None at all. There is no difficulty in executing the prohibitory law 
in Nantucket, except that there is a strong feeling in the community against 
the present law ; but whenever an attempt has been made to execute it, it 
has been successful ; there are few attempts made. 

Q. Is there much open sale in Nantucket ? 

A. There are several places ; there is no difficulty in obtaining it; but 
there is a feeling in opposition to the present prohibitory law, in many of its 
provisions. There is an objection to the agencies. People find a difficulty in 
procuring pure liquor at the town agency, not only in Nantucket, but I know 
that it is so in other places : and not only that they find at the town agencies 
miserably poor liquors, but that they are compelled to pay enormously large 
prices for them. I myself sent to the town agency in Hyannis ; I was detained 
by the storm in getting home by the steamer, and I sent for a pint of whiskey. 
The article I got was nearly the color of this table, and they charged a dollar 
for it. The liquor I wanted for medicinal purposes. I am not in the habit of 
using the article as a beverage. 

Q. Was that bought of the State Agent ? 

A. It was bought of the town a^ent. 

Q. Was that bought by him of the State Agent ? 

A. I do not know as to that ; I only know that it is required to be bought 
of the State Agent. 

Q. Your opinion is based on the general utility of liquors as a beverage, 
is it not ? 

A. No, sir. By no means. I do not recommend them as a beverago. 



APPENDIX. 297 

Q. On what basis do you recommend a license law ? 

A. I think a prohibitory law can be executed; but I do not think the 
execution of the prohibitory law checks intemperance. I know that intem- 
perance has increased, and the moderate use ' of spirits in Nantucket has 
increased very much of late. I know that twenty-five years ago there was a 
strong feeling in favor of temperance ; and there were even a number of cold 
water societies among the children ; and no man would presume to use any 
ardent spirits publicly. 

Q. Are there children at present among the drunkards in Nantucket ? 

A. I think the children are growing into the use of liquor. I think that 
the young men in that community are many of them addicted to it. 

Q. Take the children among the cold water societies, are they using 
liquor ? 

A. By no means. I think there was probably a greater aversion to the 
use of liquor at that time of which I spoke than there is now, for the reason 
that there was more said on the subject of temperance at that time, and a 
stronger feeling on the question than there is at the present time. 

Q. You do not think that the prohibition of the traffic in Nantucket can 
be carried to the extent that liquors will not be had, as a beverage ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. You do not think that the liquor-shops can be closed ? 

A. I think that the public sale of liquors can be done away with. I think 
it has been. 

Q. How was that accomplished ? 

A. Notice was given to the different places of business, and they quietly 
closed. 

Q. Do you recollect any* time when moral suasion did such a thing ? 

A. I do not know as I do. I recollect that ten or twelve years ago I, with 
several other persons, called on several dealers and tried to induce them to 
give up the traffic ; and we found that many of them were Avilling to give up 
if the others would, but others said that they knew that, if they did not sell 
it, people would have it, and therefore they were disposed to continue their 
business. 

Q. Would not a license law that would license that part that would not 
give up, influence those to continue the sale who were willing to give up ? 

A . I think not. I think that if a stringent license law were passed it 
would be very natural for those who received a license to look out for those 
who sold without licenses, and they would be very likely to know if there 
was illegal sale. 

Q. You think that if there was a license law added to the present prohibi- 
tory law, there would be no cases of private sale, except to a limited extent, 
and people wanting it would get it at the licensed places ? 

A . No, sir. That would not follow. Many of them would not go to the 
licensed places. I would have the law so rigid that no man who has made a 
bad use of liquors should get it ; and so that a man who has abused his family 
by reason of the use of it, should not have it. I would have a law so framed 
that such men could not buy it. 
88 



298 APPENDIX. 

Q. You would have no measure to affect moderate drinking ? 

A. I would not have it drank on the premises where it was bought ? 

Q. But you would have the seller deal out liquor freely, and any man, 
however immoderately he drank, provided he did not become intoxicated, 
should have an opportunity of getting it? 

A. I have not thought of the matter sufficiently to frame a license law in 
all its details ; but I think I would not have any persons appointed, as, for 
instance, those who were known by the selectmen of the towns to be improper 
persons. 

Q. Would there not be clearly an increased difficulty in applying the law, 
when you must discriminate as to the measure of inebriety, which does not exist 
now? 

A. I do not see why there should be any difficulty. I think that a judicious 
Board of Selectmen in the different towns would have an opportunity of 
knowing the individuals who were licensed. 

Q. But the difficulty is in restraining the dealer from selling to the man 
who is drinking immoderately. 

A . I would have the dealer expressly prohibited by the selectmen from 
selling to certain persons ; and I would have a license law so framed that this 
prohibition on the part of the selectmen should be strictly enforced upon the 
dealer. 

Q. Will you state the class to whom you would not permit the agent to 
sell? 

A. I would not permit him to sell to any person who was in the habit of 
making what is called an improper use of liquors, nor to a person who is in 
the habit of getting intoxicated, or who neglects his family. I am, myself, in 
favor of total abstinence from all intoxicating drinks as beverages ; but I am 
not, myself, disposed to enforce my own peculiar views in that matter, upon 
my friends. I have warm personal friends who are addicted to the use of 
ardent spirits, and I think just as much of them as I should if they were not. 

Q. What provision would you make for your friends ? 

A. I presume that if they wanted liquor they would get it somewhere. 

Q. Would it not be the same under the prohibitory law ? 

A. I think that in our case, in Nantucket, that these places that we were 
trying to get closed were places where liquor was drank on the premises. 

Q. Do you think that it required such a vigorous effort to put down the 
traffic ? Could not the State Constabulary have accomplished it ? 

A. Yes, sir ; the constabulary could have accomplished it any time — that is 
to say, the public sale. There were no prosecutions at that time ; but there has 
been a strong feeling against the law, and against the State Constabulary, 
since that time in Nantucket. I am acquainted with three State Constables, 
and they are all three accustomed to the use of ardent spirits. 

Q. Why do you not report them ? 

A. I do not consider it my special duty to report them. 

Q. When were they appointed ? 

A. The first was appointed in February last. Previous to that there had 
been some one appointed at Maltha's Vineyard. 



APPENDIX. 299 

Q. So far as you have observed the State Constabulary, compare last year 
with the previous year ? What should you say of their character ? 
A. I know nothing of them. 

Testimony op Hon. Francis B. Fat. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Your home is in Lancaster, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Were you born there ? 

A. I was born at Southborough. 

Q. You used to live in Chelsea at one time and do business in Boston, did 
you not ? 

A. Yes, sir ; for some twenty-five years. 

Q. When did you live in Chelsea? 

A. Seven years ago. 

A. At one time you were Mayor of Chelsea ? 

A. I was. 

Q. The first mayor ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And your place of business was in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you had any and what connection with the charitable institutions 
of the Commonwealth ? 

A. I have been connected with the School for Girls at Lancaster, as trustee 
and as treasurer. 

Q. In your capacity as a citizen, and in these various duties, have you 
availed yourself of the opportunities of observing the operation of the pro- 
hibitory laws against the traffic in ardent spirits ? If you have formed any 
opinions, I wish you would be kind enough to state them to the Committee in 
your own way ? 

A. I have no doubt, sir, whatever the intention may be, and whatever 
effect it was expected to have upon the use of ardent spirits, I have no doubt 
that the law, or any other of that description, has an immoral tendency upon 
society, because it tends to deceit, to falsehood, to resentment, and to all the 
other evils that grow up in the minds of men against dictation. I do not 
doubt the intention, the design, the object of the framers or projectors of the 
law. I have ever been a temperance man, and I have never had any taste 
or desire for liquors. But, sir, I do not arrive at hasty conclusions. From 
my reading and from my reflections and observations, I have come to this con- 
clusion, without any hesitation, that nothing are people so ready to combat, 
that there is nothing upon which their minds will rest almost exclusively, as 
that of prohibiting them from doing what their wishes, consistent with the 
common order of society, will justify. And I believe, sir, that this has been 
the case from Adam down to the present time, that nothing induces us so 
much as to dictate, and that there is nothing which will so soon resist. In 
saying what I have, si)*, I have never opposed any measures which have been 
brought forward to promote the cause of temperance. I desire temperance 
to be universal ; but my experience and observation lead me to believe that 
the hope can never be realized until the millenium ; that the appetites of 



300 APPENDIX. 

men cannot be controlled completely ; and therefore I have never signed any 
petition for a license law, and have never signed any remonstrance. I have 
said to the friends of the license law, and to the friends of the prohibitory 
law, I bid you God-speed ; if you can succeed, I should rejoice. But not 
having any faith in the ultimate, I cannot labor for naught. 

Q. How far do you think, practically, this legislation has been of service 
in the prevention of drunkenness, or of the evils that flow from it, among the 
classes of poor for whom you have labored ? 

A. I am not aware, sir, of any material change. I have witnessed some 
cases where gentlemen were naturally temperate to a certain extent, per- 
haps as temperate as most people are, who would call for liquor and drink it, 
to show their independence ; not because they wanted it, but because they 
were determined " not to be oppressed," as they said. Whether it was 
oppression or not, it is not for me say; but they considered it so. Therefore 
I say, that there are some cases, which have come to my knowledge, where 
the use of liquor has increased. In my own neighborhood, at present, I 
cannot say. I have been there but seven years. But one thing is certain: 
we have no places in town where liquor is sold, or known to be sold, except 
the town agency, and yet, no man can walk the streets there scarcely a day 
in the year without seeing men intoxicated. Where they get their liquor, is 
unbeknown to me. I saw one yesterday. I was at work upon an aqueduct 
that I own, which had broke loose, and a man rode by who was only just able to 
guide his horse. Another, a few months ago, was found at the corner of the 
road in the morning, dead drunk. Another was passing within less than a 
mile of my house, with a load of wood, drunk, and fell off from his wagon, and 
the wagon went over him and killed him. Therefore, there is liquor there 
somewhere, or they obtain ij from some source. Our liquor agent is our 
nearest neighbor. His shop joins my door-yard. But I have no idea that he 
sells liquor without complying with the provisions of the law. He is deacon 
of one of our churches. He is as pure a man as there is in our town ; they 
cannot get liquor there. Where they get it, is more than I know. 
* Q. Have you any hope in producing any moral improvement in society by 
declaring war against the material itself, instead of endeavoring to educate 
the taste and opinions of the community ? 

A. I have no confidence that liquor will ever become entirely eradicated 
from the community. I think that any one who studies human nature, and 
takes mankind as they are, and not as he would wish them to be, will be very 
likely, if he is not prejudiced, to arrive at that conclusion. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You speak of the condition of things in Lan- 
caster, and say that there is no sale that is known. Would it be an improve- 
ment to license men to sell there as a beverage ? 

A. Well, sir, my impression is, that it would. 

Q. How so ? Your liquor agent, you say, is a faithful man ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I do not understand that he sells for a beverage. 

Q. Is it worth the while to supply people legally for a beverage ? 

A. If such liquor law as I have planned in my own estimation substantially 
were passed, it would remove in the first place the opposition on the part of 
a large class of people — for there is a feeling of opposition in human nature to 



APPENDIX. 301 

dictation. It would regulate and limit the seller in the manner in which he 
sold, and in the persons to whom he sold. 

Q. But do you wish it sold at all as a beverage ? 

A. I wish it sold as a beverage in order to quiet the community. 

Q. It might remove the opposition to the present prohibitory law, but 
would there not spring up a stronger opposition to the license law ? Would 
there not spring up a strong feeling against the license law ? 

A. I think not very. Forty years ago there were a great many licenses 
made, and there was no opposition. 

Q. But were not people almost all drinkers, forty years ago, without 
exception ? 

A. No, sir, there were exceptions ; for I did not drink myself. 

Q. You know there have been very great changes in that respect ? 

A. Yss, sir. 

Q. Now, if the great majority of the people think it ought not to be sold, 
and think it is morally wrong to license men to sell, would you not create an 
opposition to that law which would go into politics directly ? 

A. It goes into politics now. 

Q. Would it not go into politics more decidedly than it does now ? 

A. I cannot say as to that ; it is a matter of theory. I take this ground: 
the present law is not, and, in my opinion, cannot be practically observed. 

Q. But it is active ? 

A. But the men are intemperate. 

Q. I understood you to say that liquor was not sold in Lancaster, but that 
it was drank considerably ? 

A . We do not know where it is sold ; but we have strong impressions as 
to where they get it. I think that no man ever was, or ever will be made 
moral, virtuous and religious by law. 

Q. Does not that help ? Do not laws against criminality serve to improve 
the morals of a community ? 

A. My impression is, that moral principle should be engrafted into a law. 
When a person is convinced, or in fact reformed, he needs no law. Therefore, 
I say, that the law has very little to do with reformation. 

Q. Do you go against all laws ? 

A. I go against all laws that cannot be enforced. 

Q. I understood you that the law was enforced in Lancaster ? 

A. We are all moral people there. 

Q. I would like to ask as to the habits of your people, forty-five years ago. 
Was there much liquor drank then ? 

A. Much more than there ought to have been. 

Q. Did not the store-keepers use to keep it then ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And did they not use to cany up a hogshead, every little while ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you. know much of the habits of the Southborough people now ? Do 
you not believe there were ten times the amount drank there then that there 
is now ? 

A. I could not tell. 



302 APPENDIX. 

Q. How many hogsheads do you suppose were carried into South borough, 
forty-five years ago, before the temperance movement ? 

A. From twelve to fifteen in a year. 

Q. How many hogsheads were there to each store-keeper ? 

A. Three, and sometimes four ; it was sometimes four or five to each store- 
keeper. 

Q. What was the population of Lancaster at that time ? 

A. I could not tell exactly. We had a considerable portion of what was 
used from the adjoining towns. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) I understood you that you had some definite 
notions with reference to a license law. Would you vest the power of licens- 
ing in the hands of County Commissioners as it formerly was ? 

A. That would be my impression. 

Q. You know that the County Commissioners in Worcester County 
refused, for many years, to grant licenses ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you think that would be the case at the present time ? 

A. I think not at the present time, unless the law provided that they 
should. 

Q. You think that they would not voluntarily ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of John Quincy Adams. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You have been trial justice in Quincy for some 
time ? 

A. Yes, sir ; ever since the law was passed. 

Q. Have you been the only one ? 

A . Yes, sir, until within a year. 

Q. Has that enabled you to form an opinion as to the- operation of the 
present system of prohibitory legislation ? 

A . Yes, sir ; I had tried a great many cases under it. 

Q. Will you give the Committee the result of your observations in your 
own way ? 

A. Of course the cases varied. In very many cases, and, in fact, in almost 
all the cases, the motive of operating to produce a complaint was almost 
always one of spite, or due to some irritation conceived by the complain- 
ant. They run at once to the trial justice, and state the names of all the 
persons whom they have reason to think have obtained liquor at any particu- 
lar place. These cases, of course, I could not resist ; but there was a great 
trouble in these cases, for persons would lie. I would frequently have a case 
where I knew very well that the witness was lying, and I would say to him : 
You know you are not telling the truth, and you know that I know that you 
are not telling the truth ; but yet they would not deny that they were perjur- 
ing themselves, but would go on and assert the same thing right over again. 
They seem to think, in some cases, that it is something which they are entitled 
to do. In many cases, however, the witnesses testify properly. Then there 
is another trouble ; it is, perhaps, a necessary evil. These complaints fall 
mostly on the poor. Many persons are led into this business to keep them 



x APPENDIX. 303 

from absolute want. I had one case of an Irish woman who was prosecuted 
for selling liquor, and who had been driven to it from want ; but the evidence 
was against her and she was convicted, and I took the papers and went 
immediately to the judge to get her released, and in that way the severity of 
the law was mitigated. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the practicability of exterminating the 
traffic by stopping the places of open sale ? 

A. I do not know how it may be where the opinions of people are very 
strongly one way ; but it is preposterous to attempt it near a large city like 
Boston, according to my experience. I have known of cases where the officers 
would have a general stirring up of the places and would take all the liquor, 
and where people would go, in fact, and destroy their liquor, and yet the next 
day these same places would be in full blast again ; and, what is worse, they 
get into the habit of going into back rooms, and making use of cabalistic 
signs whenever they desire to get into these places. That is what I hear 
from the officers. 

Q. Does it result in driving the sale into the dark ? 

A. It does ; and, what is worse, it makes the liquor of most terrible stuff. 
Of course they cannot get very high prices, and they make it up in this way 
by deteriorating the quality of the liquor. I happen to know something of 
this, because the liquor used to be brought into the vaults of the court-house, 
and I had occasion to decide in reference to the disposal of it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.J You say that you cannot suppress the sale down 
in Quincy ? 

A . That is my opinion. 

Q. Have you the State Constabulary there ? 

A. They try it there every few months, and suppress it entirely for a day, 
but there is no great change in the amount sold. 

Q. Have you observed other towns ? 

A. I have observed it somewhat in travelling. I was once upon Governor 
Andrew's staff, and had some occasion to notice it in my travels at that time. 

Q. Have you been aware of the police efforts in the city ? 

A . I am not acquainted with the police operations of the city. I should 
imagine that there was no great effort. I only judge from what I see in the 
street. I never formed any opinion except from these facts. I attributed it 
to the reason that it was impossible to carry out the law in Boston, and that 
after one or two comparatively reasonable efforts, they had given it up. 

Q. Your impression is that it is within two or three years ? 

A. I think the last squabble was some two or three years ago. It was 
stated to me that they presented so many cases that it was impossible to 
obtain convictions. 

Testimony of Henry Hill. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How long have you lived in Boston ? 

A. About forty-four years. 

Q. Have you come to any conclusions in reference to the expediency oi 
the present prohibitory law, as to its effects in the suppression of intemperance 
and drunkenness .' 



304 APPENDIX. 

A. Perhaps I ought to say in regard to my residence that, although my 
place of business has been in Boston for the whole period that I mention, I 
now reside in Braintree, and have also resided in Koxbury of late. I have 
been in favor of what has been called the Maine law, which, I suppose, has 
operated very well in the country, in small places ; but I have supposed that 
it was to a great extent inoperative in cities and large towns. I have come 
to the conclusion that the law cannot be carried out in large towns and cities ; 
and, therefore, it has seemed to me that something else was necessary, some- 
thing more and something different from the present laws. And it has seemed 
to me that a stringent license law, perhaps like the law recently enacted in 
New York, would aid in the suppression of intemperance. 

Q. Do they openly sell brandies and whiskey in Braintree ? 

A. Not that I am aware of. 

Q. Is their intemperance there, so far as you know ? 

A. It is said, and I believe it to be true, that in Braintree and in Wey- 
mouth, (I am almost on the line of Weymouth,) almost all the Irish women 
sell intoxicating liquors. 

Q. No public sales that you are aware of? 

A. Not that I am aware of; though I have not been about a great deal. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) What is your present business ? 

A. I am treasurer of the American Tract Society. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Has there been a worse or a better state of things, 
speaking in general terms, in regard to the use of liquor, than there was 
twenty years ago. 

A. I have only been for the last six years in the neighborhood where I am 
now residing. 

Q. So far as your observation goes in that community and in others that 
you have been acquainted with for the past twenty years ? 

A. I do not know that I could give any definite opinion on that subject. 

Q. Have you any reason to think that the state of things in regard to the 
sale of liquors was worse then than you have known it in other places ? 

A. I should think it was, sir. 

Q. Among Americans or foreigners ? 

A . I never have distinguished. 

Q. Do you not think it is quite proper to allow something for the foreign 
element coming among us ? 

A. I have no doubt that would make some difference. 

Q. Excluding that class of society, is not the community in your neigh- 
borhood as good in this respect ? 

A. I think there is a great deal of intoxicating liquor drank, sir. 

Q. I understand that you do not see much drunkenness ? 

A. No, sir. I am not where I am likely to see. 

A. How large a number do you see each day who are drunk ? 

A. I do not know. There are a good many cases where persons who are 
drunk are brought before the courts. 

Q. Do you know of any time within twenty years when that could not be 
seen? 



APPENDIX. 305 

Q. I think I could see no more cases of public offences in Roxbury twenty 
or thirty years ago than I do now. 

Q. Have you observed the extermination of any crime by law or moral 
suasion, or by both ? 

A. I believe that almost all laws are violated more or less. 

Q. Have you any reason to think that if a prohibitory law were as well 
executed as is practicable with an adequate force, do you not think that the 
open traffic could be suppressed, and that, after a time, a new generation 
could be grown which should be largely free from such contamination ? 

A. I do not think that the present laws can be enforced so as to suppress 
intemperance to so great an extent as could be done by a stringent license 
law. 

Q. Precisely what kind of a license law would you introduce ? 
, A, I have never assisted in framing any law ; but I should refer to the 
laws (as alluded to in the papers) enacted in the State of New York. 

Q. Do you suppose that the system of drinking is less rife in New York 
than in Massachusetts ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not. 

Q. Then how can you state the instances ? 

A. I know something of the city of New York and something of the city 
of Boston. I think that the laws, if enforced, would have a good effect in 
the city of Boston. 

Q. Do you or do you not feel that the example of the moderate use by 
clergymen and church officers and high officials, is detrimental to the public 
good? 

A. I do. 

Q. You are yourself a temperance man, as the phrase is generally 
understood V 

A. I have been for the last forty years making the experiment of doing 
without intoxicating drinks, and I think it works very well thus far. 

Q. Have you any doubt that the public good would be very much pro- 
moted if all high officials should do without it ? 

A. I think it would. 

Q. Do you think that prohibition can be said to have had a fair trial in 
any community where the clergy and civil officers and high officials have 
thrown their practical example against the law ? 

Q. I have not known such a case. I do not know what would be the 
effect. 

Adjourned. 

39 



306 APPENDIX. 



TENTH DAY. 

Thursday, March 7th, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and resumed the hearing of testi 
mony in behalf of the petitioners. 

Testimony of Rev. Frederick H. Hedge, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Where is your residence ? 

A. In Brookline. 

Q. How long have you been in the ministry ? 

A. For thirty-seven years. 

Q. Have you been in this State for the whole time ? 

A. I was fifteen years in Maine, and six years and a half in Rhode 
Island. I have been at Brookline for ten years. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state any conclusion to which you may 
have been led, as to the effect on society of any attempt to constrain men to 
temperance by prohibitory legislation ? 

A. My experience has not been very extensive in respect to this subject 
My observation, perhaps, has not been quite so close as that of other men 
who have had equal opportunities of observation ; but as far as my observa- 
tion and experience go, I am decidedly of the opinion that the enactment of 
the prohibitory liquor law, which aims at the entire suppression of the sale of 
liquors, expecting thereby to prevent and suppress intemperance, was a mis- 
taken legislation, and that it has not accomplished the end desired. I think 
the law militates against several important principles or interests. It seems 
to me to be a violation of the very obvious principle, that where there is a 
demand, there will, in the nature of things, be a supply, and that, if the 
supply is not open and allowed, it will be secret and illegitimate. If it could 
be established, — if I could, myself, admit the principle that the use of all 
alcoholic liquors was a sin, it would follow, of course, that the sale of them 
was a sin ; if the sale of it were a sin, then the Legislature would have a 
right to suppress it altogether, even at the risk of secret gratification — a risk 
which, of course, is assumed in relation to every sin, and in all attempts to 
prohibit sin. In individual cases, it may be, (but, according to the best of my 
judgment, it cannot be established as an absolute principle), that the use or 
sale of alcoholic liquors is a sin ; and, therefore, it seems to me, it is unwise 
legislation to make that secret and illegitimate which had better, if it exist 
at all, be in the face of day, and open. I have been told by those who have 
good opportunities of knowing, and it has been the impression that I have 
received from reading the reports of the testimony offered before this Com- 
mittee, that the attempt to prohibit the sale of liquor drives it into out-of- 
the-way places, into the cellars and dark corners, where, I suppose, it does 
a great deal more harm than it would in the face of day. In attempting to 
suppress a great evil in that way, I consider that the State creates a crime 
to suppress an evil. The law being on the statute-book, any violation of 



APPENDIX. 307 

that law is a crime, and a crime against the Commonwealth. I think that 
the prohibitory measures which have been employed here and elsewhere for 
the suppression of the sale of liquor, has tended to create a great deal of moral 
evil, in attempting to suppress a physical evil, for intemperance is largely 
to be considered under that head. It has created a great deal of moral 
evil — a great deal of concealment and hypocrisy — a great many attempts 
to evade the law, by people who ought to be above the necessity of any 
vindication of their conduct. It has had the effect of driving ministers 
of the gospel to concealment, because public opinion would not sanction a 
use which they considered, in the exercise of their best judgment, to be 
lawful. On the other hand, I think that it has created a rebellious feeling — 
an alienation, among a certain class of people, from the law. It has had a 
tendency to throw contempt upon law, and to diminish the reverence which 
ought to be entertained for the law. Moreover, it seems to me that the law 
makes a great mistake in not discriminating between different articles of 
drink, which seem to me to be essentially different in their kind, and in their 
operation, and the use of which is attended with very different effects. It 
does not discriminate between the use of pure alcohol, and the use of liquors 
which have something of the alcoholic principle in them, but whose effect is 
very different from that of whiskey, rum, gin, &c. The law prohibits the sale 
of beer, of ale, of cider and of wine, as well as of ardent spirits. That want 
of discrimination has always seemed to me to be a mistake with legislation. 

I spoke of the hypocrisy which is engendered, either directly or indirectly, 
by these prohibitory laws. I remember being in Maine, very soon after the 
passage of the famous Maine Law, and a gentleman whom I met at a public 
house, who was on a lecturing tour, was advocating the law. I expressed my 
doubt about the law and my regret that it had ever been passed. He said 
that " it was a very good law ; that it did not prevent a gentleman from 
having his wine ; that he used his wine as he had always done, and if I lived 
in the State it would be easy for me to have and use wine." It seemed to 
me that that was an illustration of the moral influence exerted by that law 
and by that species of legislation, which I considered very much to be 
deprecated. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do I understand you to make a difference 
between fermented and distilled liquors ? 

A . Yes, sir. I suppose that the use of distilled liquors is more deleterious 
than the use of fermented. It requires a smaller portion of distilled than of 
fermented liquor to produce an injurious effect. 

Q. But is there any difference in the nature of the article ? 

A. That is a question for chemists and physiologists to decide. I can only 
say, from my own experience, that it would not agree with me to drink ardent 
spirits in any shape. I have not had a great deal of experience in their use, 
but what little I have had convinces me that they would not be well for me. 
They were once prescribed for me by a physician, but, after two days' trial, I 
was confident that it was not the remedy for me. I never experienced any 
ill effect from the use of fermented liquor, which I have never, in theory at 
least, disused. Practically, for years, I have not used fermented liquor, but 
have always thought I had the right to use it. 



308 APPENDIX. 

Q. You have travelled in Europe, I presume ? 

A. I have. 

Q. Have you ever observed in the different countries the different degrees 
of temperance or intemperance ? 

A. I never saw a case of drunkenness in Italy. I was there six months, but 
never witnessed a case of intoxication. I was in Germany more than five 
years. I have seen there, during that time, cases of excitement from the use 
of liquor, but I do not remember any case of confirmed intemperance. I 
suppose there were such cases, but they were so few in number as not to make 
themselves prominent. In France I saw one or two cases during the short 
time that I was there, of what seemed to me, at least, to be intoxication ; but 
from my experience in Europe, I should say that the opportunities there exist- 
ing for procuring cheap wines and cheap malt liquors, were somewhat of a safe- 
guard against the evils resulting from the use of distilled liquors. 

Q. The Germans drink beer chiefly, I suppose ? 

A. They drink beer chiefly, although in Southern Germany a great deal 
of wine is used. 

Q. Their beers are generally of a lighter kind, are they not ? 

A. The Bavarian beer, I should say, was as strong as English ale, but the 
beer used in other parts of Germany is very light indeed ; it has hardly 
any of the alcoholic principle in it. 

Q. In countries where they used stronger beer, did you not observe a gen- 
eral dullness among the people ? 

A. I have heard that that was the effect of the stronger beers, but I can- 
not say that my own experience confirms the statement. Certainly, the Aus- 
trians and Bavarians are not so lively a people as the Italians and the French, 
but whether it is owing to the use of malt liquors, or to the climate and race 
I cannot say. I think it probable that malt liquors may have that effect. 

Q. Have you been much in England ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you observed the effect of the use of strong beers upon the 
English ? 

A. I have had limited opportunities for observation, but in London I 
should say that there was a good deal of intemperance ; whether owing to the 
use of malt liquors or of ardent spirits, I cannot say. My stay there was not 
more than two months, but I saw more cases of intoxication in England 
during those two months, than I did on the Continent in five years. 

Q. Did you ever hear much said, while you were in Paris, of the habit of 
the people of going, on Saturday or Sunday, outside of the walls of the city, 
where wine could be obtained cheaply, and having a " high time " there, and 
getting intoxicated ? Did you observe or hear that they drank to that excess 
that they would become stupid, and waste their time and money ? 

A. r I do not remember hearing that in Paris. I remember one very remark- 
able incident in Saxony. There was a festival, at which I should think some 
twenty thousand people were present, — a popular festival — a gathering of the 
inhabitants of the city, and of the country around. I saw that drinks of all 
kinds were sold at the tables. I was on the ground for four or five hours, but 
I did not see a single case of intoxication, or anything approaching it. 



APPENDIX. 309 

Q. Do you suppose that we can get any of the pure wines of Europe in 
this country ? 

A. I think that we get them as pure as they are made in Europe. There 
is a great deal of adulteration of wine in Europe. I think that it is possible 
to get wines as pure as are used there. 

Q. You say that there is a great deal of adulteration there ; but is there 
not a good deal of wine sold, that is unadulterated and pure ? 

A. The pure wines are of two kinds, — one so light as not to bear exporta- 
tion. They are very light wines, indeed. There are one or two of the 
Rhenish wines of that character, and one or two of the Italian ; — they are as 
light as the weakest cider. Such wines are not exported, because they would 
not bear exportation. Another kind of wine is exceedingly expensive and 
difficult to obtain, because it is grown only in certain and very limited locali- 
ties, — the Hungarian wine, for instance. Such wines, I suppose, are never 
exported. Of course, there is a pretence of exportation ; but I suppose that 
unless some gentleman for his own private use brings them out of the country, 
that they are never exported. 

Q. Those wines are very limited in quantity, are they not ? 

A. They are said to be very limited. 

Q. Could you find an article sold for them in almost any store or hotel in 
Europe or America ? 

A. It may be so. I think, however, that I never heard of Tokay being 
sold in this country at the stores, but I have heard of some of the other choice 
wines being sold. 

Q. Have you any idea that they were what they were represented to be ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You spoke of the lighter wines being unfit for exportation without 
enforcement. Do you know whether even the stronger wines, such as 
Madeira and Sherry are also enforced before they are shipped ? 

A. I think likely they are. I judge so from the very general belief that 
they are enforced. 

Q. Do you not believe that there are a great many preperations which 
are sold as wine here and represented as imported that are not genuine ? 

A . That is a thing I should be obliged to take upon trust entirely. 

Q. Have you not an opinion about it ? 

A. I cannot say that I have formed any very definite opinion about it. 
My impression is that such wines are sold, — or at least wines that contain a 
very small proportion indeed of the genuine article which they purport to be. 
They are mixed with articles more or less injurious. Sometimes wines are 
manufactured which are perhaps no more injurious than the genuine would 
be. It depends upon what articles are used in adulteration. 

Q. But such preparations are not wines ? 

A. They are wines, 1 am told ; — tney are imitations by combination. A 
very light wine is taken as a base, and other pure wines mixed with it. A 
flavor is thus given to the article which will change its character. 

Q. But do you not know that the adulterated wines are taking the place 
of every other, — that the articles used here are so unlike the pure, simple 
wines used there, that they are to be regarded as a very different article from 



310 APPENDIX. 

the pure wine. If you thought that the use of the natural, simple wine might 
be beneficial to you, would it not still be a question with you whether the 
article here sold as wine, was enough like the genuine to be considered 
beneficial ? 

A. It would depend upon circumstances. It would depend upon where 
the article was bought, and of the probability there was of the pure article 
being found in the place. If I go to an importing house, I suppose that there 
is a reasonable probability of getting as pure an article as is sold ; but in 
drinking saloons, I suppose that it is improbable that such an article could be 
found. 

Q. If you should go to the most respectable importer in the city, and want 
some of the best wine, and he should tell you that he had it, and you should 
ask him if his wine was enforced, and he should say that it would not bear 
the voyage without being enforced with brandy, which was substantially the 
same thing ; what would you think of the use of such wine, as compared with 
the simple wine ? 

A. I answered that question when I said that wines could probably be 
bought as pure here as on the other side in the shops and drinking-houses. I 
suppose that they are enforced there, before they are exported. 

Q. Do you not think that they are often enforced by alcohol made from 
American whiskey ? 

A. I have no means of knowing, and have no right to any opinion about 
it. 

Q. But, considering the adulterations and the enforcement which wines 
undergo, you are satisfied that the wines ordinarily sold here are very different 
from the pure simple wines which they are represented to be ? 

A. I suppose, that in drinking-saloons, and in out-of-the-way taverns 
or such places as are usually designated as low taverns, you would not be 
likely to find anything like a pure article. 

Q. You spoke of the influence of prohibitory legislation in making men 
deceitful and hypocritical, &c. You were in Maine awhile ? 

A. I was not a resident of Maine after the Maine Law was passed. 

Q. You were understood to say that intemperance was rather a physical 
than a moral evil ; have we understood you correctly ? 

A. I think that it is in a great many cases. I do not mean to say that 
there is no moral evil connected with it ; but in some cases that have been 
known to me, I think that it is very much to be regarded as a disease. 

Q. Has not your observation and reading shown you that two-thirds or 
three-fourths of all the offences against the laws, have been committed under 
the influence of intoxicating drinks, either directly or indirectly ? 

A. I think that a very large proportion are. 

Q. Then does it not produce a very great degree of moral evil ? 

A. I have been understood, perhaps, as distinguishing more closely than I 
intended to do, between what is purely moral and what is imperfectly so. 
What I desire to say is, that a man who should commit murder or man- 
slaughter, under the influence of liquor, would not be guilty of the same 
amount of moral wrong, and the act would not have the same moral charac- 
ter, as the act of a man who deliberately planned and executed a murder. 



APPENDIX. 311 

Q. Suppose a man has a desire to murder, and takes brandy enough to 
stupefy his moral faculties before committing the act, what would you think of 
the morality of the act in such a case ? 

A. I should think the act just as immoral as if the brandy had not been 
taken. In that case the use of the brandy would be a means to accomplish 
the end. If such means are adopted with a view to that end, of course the 
morality of the act is the same. 

Q. Are there not many families made miserable by the intemperate habits 
of some member of the family ? 

A. Certainly ; there can be no doubt about that. 

Q. And a great deal of poverty, degradation, vice and misery of every 
kind caused by intemperance ? 

A. There is no doubt of it. t 

Q. Do you know of any particular benefits to the community, arising from 
the use of distilled liquors ? 

A. I am not prepared to answer that question. It is a question that I 
must leave to the physicians who prescribe ardent spirits. I cannot say that 
I have ever seen any good effects resulting from their use, but I have no right 
to suppose there never is any good derived from their use. 

Q. But you are aware that there are a great many evils resulting from 
their use ? 

A. Yes, sir, 

Q, Then, acting for the best good of the community, desiring to produce 
the greatest amount of good, should that possible, trifling good, be placed as 
an offset to the great evils that are known ? If by prohibition, you could get 
rid of the great evils to a great extent, would it not be worth while to 
prohibit the sale of liquor, although sometimes there may be some trifling 
good resulting from it ? 

A. I am not prepared to answer that question either in the affirmative or 
in the negative. I have not entirely made up my mind upon that subject. 
But of one thing I am very well satisfied: that a prohibitory law, or an 
attempt to prohibit entirely the use of liquor, will not effect the end desired. 

Q. Is it not, in your judgment, a moral evil or wrong for an individual to 
indulge in a habit without any very sensible good resulting from it, and the 
consequences of which so often are evil, and that evil so very great ? For 
instance, seeing the great evils of intemperance in a community, a man says : 
" I drink my glass of liquor once per day ; I do not see that that hurts me 
much, but I see that men become intemperate before they are aware of it ; 
and considering the evils which result to others from the habit, I will not 
sanction by my practice a custom which produces so much evil." Would 
you not think that such a man had taken a wise course ? 

A. I should say that a man was perfectly justified in taking that position. 
I am not prepared however, to say that it is morally obligatory upon him to 
do so. 

Q. Is it not morally obligatory upon every man to pursue just such a 
course of life as will be most beneficial to himself and to the community ? 

[Question objected to, and waived.] 



312 APPENDIX. 

Testimony of Rev. Rufus Ellis. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are the pastor of the Chauncy Street 
Church? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been in the ministry ? 

A. Twenty-six years. 

Q. At that place ? 

A. I have been fourteen years with the Chauncy Street Church, ten 
years at Northampton, and a portion of the time at Rochester, New York. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state the result of your observations as to 
the effect of prohibitory legislation in inculcating temperance ? 

A. I have observed its effect, not very closely, perhaps, but yet to a 
considerable extent, in my intercourse with the various classes — not only with 
persons in good circumstances, but also with the poor, and sometimes with 
the very poor in the country and in the city. My impression is very strong 
that very little good is to be expected in this matter from any form of law ; 
that if any one is expecting great results from a license law, he will be 
disappointed, and that those who have expected great results from a prohibi- 
tory law have been disappointed. I have not however been inclined to think 
that all the apparent increase of intemperance of late years is to be attributed 
to the prohibitory law. It was something that we all looked for as a part of 
the inevitable demoralization of the country that would result from a great 
war ; and affecting as it did not only those who went to the war, but also 
those who remained at home, in the excitement that was produced in the 
whole community, in the more careless ways of living, and in the greater 
freedom of the persons who remained behind. I think that a great deal of 
the trouble is to be attributed to the war, but I think also that a part of it 
is to be ascribed to the prohibitory law, which it seems to me to be ill-founded 
in principle and inefficient in its workings. It is a law that I do not think can 
be carried out for the reason that the conscience and judgment of the 
community do not go along with it. There are a great many persons whose 
opinions are entitled to consideration and weight, who believe that it is an 
unsound and unjustifiable measure. I have noticed that some persons have 
said that there was a great difference between the city and the country in 
this respect. 

I have lived ten years in the country, where that law was supposed to be 
pretty generally enforced ; where the most respectable portion of the inhabi- 
tants were in the habit of going to the liquor agency to obtain what the phy- 
sicians prescribed ; but I do not think that there was any gain in respect to 
temperance in that neighborhood from the action of the law, and a great deal 
of the attempt to enforce the law was very careless, even there ; and it seemed 
to me, from the very force of circumstances, inevitably so. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you think it possible to discriminate closely in 
a great social question, like that under consideration, between the conse- 
quences of the great public excitement to which you refer, upon soldiers and 
civilians, on the one hand, and an objectionable law on the other hand ? 

A. I do not know that it is. 



APPENDIX. 313 

Q. As a matter of fact, are you able to trace any evil consequences which 
you may have noticed in this community, to the influence of the law, or do 
you rather in theory connect them with the law ? 

A. I think that I could, in actual fact, connect many of them with the law, 
although I attribute a vast deal of intemperance to the war. 

Q. Do you think that there is anything pertaining to such laws tending to 
demoralize, that does not attach to the laws respecting gambling ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think there is. I think that the fact that the moral sentis 
ment of a large portion of the community does not approve the law, tend- 
to demoralize the community, as does also the fact that an attempt to prohibit 
entirely the sale of ardent spirits would drive the traffic into secret places. 

Q. The question is, whether there is anything in the principle of prohibi- 
tion, as applied to this social evil, that is not involved in the principle of pro- 
hibition as applied to other social evils ? 

A. I think that the use of ardent spirits, in any way, in its purer forms, — 
in wine, or even in cider or beer, — is not to be regarded as what the moralist 
would call " malum per se" as an evil in and of itself. 

Q. Do you not think that the encouragement by example of a social custom, 
out of which so great social evils flow, by a steady tendency becomes itself a 
sin ? Granting the absence of sin per se in the use of a single glass, is not a 
moral man, or a Christian man, called upon from mere duty and upon the 
ground of conscience, to abjure a custom which, by so steady a law, tends to 
increase such great social evils ? 

A. I think that is a question which would be answered very differently by 
different persons. I would not undertake to dictate an answer to such a 
question, but would respect the conscientious judgment of others. 
Q. I ask your own opinion ? 

A. I should not pronounce definitely in the affirmative. 
Q. What view do you take of Paul's remark, that he would neither eat 
meat, nor drink wine, nor do anything whereby his brother should be 
offended or made weak V 

A. That very text was in my mind when you first asked the question. 
It would take me a good while to explain my application of that to the matter 
in hand ; but I do not regard it as settling the question authoritatively in the 
affirmative. It would take me a good while to unfold my reasons for that 
conviction. I do not regard Paul as having settled the question in that way. 
Understand, however, that I do not object to his authority, but to the 
application. 

Q. But do you think that a man does wrong in pursuing a practice, out of 
which so great social evils flow ? 

A. He may or he may not do wrong ; it depends entirely upon the special 
circumstances in which he is placed. 

Q. But placed in the midst of a community like this in which we live ? 
A. Still there might be a great difference in circumstances. For instance, 
if I were surrounded, as I have been in the course of my life, by young stu- 
dents, living in my family, and I wished to train them in a particular course, 
I should feel bound to do, and to abstain from doing, a great many things 
which I should not do or abstain from under other circumstances. 
40 



314 APPENDIX. 

Q. But do you not think that the same principle which would lead you to 
abstain from a particular practice in the presence of students, would lead you, 
as a citizen of a community which would naturally know your customs, to 
refrain from doing that which would exert a deleterious influence upon 
society ? 

A. I suppose that it would require half an hour's talk to explain myself 
fully, without the liability of being misrepresented. 

Testimony of Prof. Francis Bowen. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Your home is in Cambridge ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is your profession ? 

A. I am a professor in Harvard College, of Natural Religion and Moral 
Philosophy. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state in ' your own way to what results 
your mind has been brought, if to any, concerning the moral utility and 
advantage to the people, of an attempt to promote temperance by prohib- 
itory legislation ? 

A. Perhaps my opinion or testimony in respect to the practical operation 
of a prohibitory law is not worth much, as my means of observation have 
been rather limited, but so far as my observation has extended, I am of the 
opinion that the law is inoperative for good, and that it is operative, to some 
extent, for evil. In the city in which I live — a city of thirty thousand inhab- 
itants — it is as easy to buy liquor now as it is to buy bread, and it can be had, 
even, at a greater number of places. Perhaps we need not seek far for the 
reason. Under a popular government like ours, criminal law can have very 
little influence for good except it is backed up and supported by the moral 
sense, not merely of a majority of the community, but of vastly the larger 
portion of the community. In civil matters a mere majority of the com- 
munity or legislature may decide, and the law which they make will be 
respected ; but in criminal matters it is not for the legislature to tell me, or to 
tell any other man, what is absolutely right or what is absolutely wrong. That 
is a matter between me and my conscience and my God. So far as the crim- 
inal law of the community is in conformity with the moral sense of the whole 
community, or of vastly the larger portion of that community, in my opinion, 
it will be enforced ; but notoriously that is not the case with this prohibitory 
law respecting the sale of liquor. A very large number doubt whether the 
sale of liquor is any moral offence whatever. Those who do not positively 
deny it to be a moral offence, are in doubt upon the subject. The number who 
positively affirm it to be a sin, cannot be even a large minority — cannot be 
equal to one-half of the community. Under such circumstances the law can- 
not be enforced, because it requires the co-operation of a very large number 
of persons; and where those doubts exist, or where the denial is positively 
made, constables will not arrest, witnesses will not give evidence, and juries 
will not convict. Unfortunately, those of the community who are very scrup- 
ulous in respect to their moral conduct, and who are inclined strongly to be 
law-abiding men, and would therefore be the safest persons to sell liquor 
— if any persons could be safe in such a charge — they, out of self-respect, 



APPENDIX. 315 

will abandon the business, and it falls into the hands of the unscrupulous, and 
of those who defy the laws. I am of the opinion that any criminal law which 
cannot be enforced, weakens the efficacy of the other branches of criminal 
law. If you will permit me to use a professional illustration, I would say that 
no good instructor lays down a rule of discipline in his establishment which 
he thinks that he cannot enforce, or is doubtful whether he can or not, because 
he knows that the existence of such a rule, if not enforced, would shake his 
authority, and lead those under his care to despise and neglect other laws. I 
am of the opinion, decidedly, as a moralist, and a political economist, that 
criminal legislation should be restricted within the narrowest possible limits. 
It is not enough to say that a thing is wrong to justify you in making a law 
for the punishment of it. You must be sure, not only that the act is wrong, 
but that it is in your power to suppress the act, otherwise your law will do 
more harm than good. I am confirmed to some extent in this opinion, by 
some limited opportunities for observation in other countries besides our own. 
I have at different times resided, perhaps, for six months in Italy, and six 
months in France, and it so happened, to the best of my present recollection 
and belief, that I never saw a drunken person in either of those countries, 
yet the use of wine there may be said to be universal. A person no more 
thinks of taking his dinner without some of the cheap, light wines of the 
country on his table, than he thinks of eating meat without bread. And 
because the use and sale of liquor are not forbidden, the places at which it 
is sold are under strict observation and surveillance by the police ; and, 
although I have had but limited means of observation in that respect, yet 
what I could see, led me to believe that those places were very well regulated, 
and that the persons who kept them were the first to call in the aid of the 
police if one of their customers became uproarious in any way, or was in any 
manner the cause of disturbance. It appeared to me that the shops for the 
sale of liquor, judging from the exterior, were about as well regulated as the 
shops for the sale of dry goods. I have always hoped that we might become, 
in this country, a vine-growing and a wine-using people. I suppose that 
there is no difficulty in obtaining pure American wines at the present day. 
If they could be very much cheapened, I think the vice of intemperance 
would be very much diminished ; for I judge from the observations of others, 
and to a limited extent from my own, that the effect of those light wines is to 
quench thirst, while the effect of stronger wines and of spirituous liquors is 
to create thirst. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you think that there are any families in Cam- 
bridge without liquors in their houses ? 

A. I really cannot answer the question. 

Q. Do you think there are any without bread ? 

A. I should hope not. 

Q. Do you, then, speak literally, when you say that you think liquor could 
be found in more places than bread in Cambridge ? 

A. I meant by that that you could buy liquor in more places than you 
could buy bread, not that it was so commonly found in the possession oi 
individuals. 



316 APPENDIX. 

Q. What is the theory of our government in regard to the law-making 
power ? Does it rest with the minority or with the majority ? 

A. Our theory is that it rests exclusively with the majority. Unfortunately 
our practice is the same. It is a great misfortune. 

Q. The theory and practice is, that the law-making power rests with the 
majority, and that is our great misfortune ? 

A. Well, sir, I could not qualify the remark without entering into a long 
dissertation upon the subject. 

Q. Do you not think it the duty of the minority, in a country like this, to 
submit to the laws which in theory and in practice the majority have the right 
to make ? 

A. Civil laws, yes ; criminal laws, when they go against the conscience 
and what we regard as the higher law — the law of God — no. 

Q. Do you think a law of a police character, like that which would remove 
the open sale of liquors as a beverage, is a law which goes against any man's 
conscience ? 

A. There is a difference between going against the conscience and being 
supported by the conscience. I should say, generally, that it was wrong to 
make an act criminal by law which was not condemned by conscience. 

Q. My question is : Is it the duty of the minority to submit to the laws 
under a popular government like our own, which the majority, in accordance 
with their right, have made ? 

A. The word "minority" is a word of very uncertain significance. It 
may mean six persons, or it may mean six persons less than one-half of the 
whole community. 

Q. Let it mean, if you please, just one less ? 

A. Then I doubt whether it it the duty of the community to consider that 
as a crime which only one person more than the minority of the community 
declares to be a crime. It would be much safer for a man to trust to his own 
conscience rather than to trust to a majority of one. 

Q. Suppose, instead of conscience, it were appetite that rebelled ? 

A. Of course the appetite should submit to conscience ? 

Q. May not a moderate drinker — one not quite a drunkard — mistake the 
pleadings of appetite for the pleadings of conscience ? 

A. Unquestionably. 

Q. You spoke about the traffic, under such a law as we now have, falling 
into unscrupulous hands, because there are men who will sell contrary to law. 
Do you not therein say that a man who will not obey the law is unscrupulous ? 

A. I spoke in regard to that class of the community whose consciences are 
so nice that they would avoid the least shadow of offence, and who, of course, 
are the best persons to be trusted with the sale of liquor, if any persons are 
to be trusted. 

Q. Suppose a license law should be enacted which should give discrimina- 
tion to the towns and municipalities, and certain towns should vote not to 
tolerate the sale at all, do you think that those towns would suffer any evil 
from that action ? 

A. It would depend upon the circumstances ; upon the amount of popula- 
tion and the comparative number of dissentients. 



APPENDIX. 317 

Q. Suppose they were unanimous, and that they should unanimously and 
gladly submit to the prohibition ? 

A. Then of course prohibition would be useless, because no one would be 
tempted to buy liquor under such circumstances. 

Q. Then can a license for the sale of liquor as a beverage be for the 
public good, resting on its merits ? 

A. Not in that case. 

Q. Can it be in any case, resting upon its merits, and aside from public 
opinion ? 

.4. I hardly understand the point of the question. 

Q. Many people in our community desire to have liquor as a beverage ; 
would it be an evil upon this community if the sale of liquor were to be 
suppressed. 

A . I suppose not. It is, however, a question for physicians and physiolo- 
gists to answer, how great are its uses in medicine or for hygienic purposes. 

Q. I merely included liquor as a beverage. 

A. Even as a beverage I know that it is very frequently ordered by 
physicians. 

Q. Medicinally ? 

A. Yes, sir ; as a tonic. 

Q. In theory, are you opposed to the moderate use of alcoholic beverages, 
simply as such, by men in health ? 

A . I am opposed to the indiscriminate use of ardent spirits ; for reasons 
already given I am in favor of the use of light and cheap wines and malt 
liquors. 

Q. Upon account of the alcohol they contain, or upon account of their 
nutritive properties, aside from the alcoholic ? 

A. For neither of these reasons. Judging from their practical effect, it 
seems to me that the indiscriminate use of ardent spirits is bad. The prac- 
tical effect, judging from my own observations of the use of light wines and 
malt liquors, is good. 

Q. Do fermented liquors of any kind minister to the human system in any 
way ? 

A. You must ask one who is a better physiologist than I. I can only say 
that my physician has recommended the use of them to me, although I have 
followed his advice to a very limited extent. 

Q. You spoke of not seeing any intoxicated persons abroad, and yet you 
spoke of uproarious persons being taken into custody. 

A. I said that I had never seen an instance of uproarious persons at those 
drinking shops, and I was told that the reason was, that if there should be 
any such disturbance, the aid of the police would be immediately called in, 
and therefore such occurrences were comparatively unknown. 

Q. How many drunken men have you seen here, within six months ? 

A. I could not give you the exact number. I can only say, that I have 
seen them frequently within the last month. Day before yesterday I saw a 
man so drunk that he was obliged to sit down in a door-way. 

Q. Was that in Boston, or in Cambridge ? 

A. That was in Boston, but I also see them frequently in Cambridge. 



318 APPENDIX. 

Q. You spoke, by way of illustration, of the laws given to pupils. As ? 
matter of fact, does the board of government, of which you are a member, 
repeal all laws which are not obeyed by the students ? 

A. The practical government, the Faculty, wish to; those who are not 
so well acquainted with the business of education as the Faculty are 
sometimes unwilling to consent to such a repeal. 

Q. Did you ever know a law to be repealed from your code because it 
was not enforced ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to name the incident ? 

A . The law against playing cards, which it was impossible to enforce ; the 
law about theatrical entertainments, which, I think, however, is not repealed, 
but exists in a modified form. It was very considerably modified, because it 
was found inoperative. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) You spoke of finding so little intemperance abroad, 
and yet you say that wines are generally used ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How then do you account for so little intemperance if wines are 
generally used ? 

A. The use of those light wines quenches thirst without causing intoxica- 
tion ; therefore, persons do not seek for stronger wines and distilled spirits 
which cause intoxication. 

Q. Suppose the use of wine here was as general as it is there, could the 
same quality of wine be found in sufficient quantities ? 

A. I think that the light Catawba wines from Ohio, and the light wines 
from California, are as- good, and even better than the light wines in common 
use in France and Italy. Unfortunately, the Ohio and California wines are 
as yet, comparatively dear. In Italy and in France, a bottle of those light 
wines can be bought for about ten cents. 

Q. Then those who would use wine here, are compelled to use something 
different from the wine used in Europe ? 

A. Not entirely. The lighter Italian wines are, to some extent, imported 
and used here. I know some gentlemen in Cambridge who have imported at 
different times, several casks of choice light wines raised in the vicinity of 
Naples, and as the wines were imported directly from Naples, I have no doubt 
of their essential purity. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I would like you to state, as briefly as you can, 
and in general terms, your views of the drinking usages of society, connected 
with the sale of liquors, as bearing upon the great subject of political economy, 
or if you please, upon the growth and wealth of a community. 

A. Unquestionably, intemperance is destructive of the economical 
resources of the community ; concerning laws prohibiting the sale of liquor, 
what effect they would have, is another subject. 

Testimony of Rev. Theodore Edson, D. D. 
Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside and what is your occupation ? 
A. I am a clergyman and reside in Lowell. 
Q. Of what denomination ? 



APPENDIX. 319 

A. Episcopal. 

Q. Do your labors bring you very much in contact with the poor, and 
enable you to observe the condition of the lower classes ? 

A. They do, extensively. 

Q. What is the state of things, in regard to intemperance now, as 
compared with what it was twenty years ago. 

A. Judging from my own observation, I think that there is more intem- 
perance now than then. 

Q. Do you think that liquor is, or is not, publicly sold in the city of Lowell ? 

A. I think that it is sold freely. I do not know how extensive the sale is, 
but my opinion is that liquor can be obtained very readily. 

Q. I would inquire whether you have formed any opinion from facts 
which have come under your own observation, as to the effect of the present 
prohibitory law in checking intemperance ? 

A. It is a subject in which I was a good deal interested, and which I ex- 
amined closely at the time of the enactment of the law, and its going into 
effect in our city. My opinion then was, and now is, that its tendency has 
been to increase drunkenness. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the most effective means of promoting 
temperance ? 

A. I think that religious principles and truths are altogether the most 
efficient. 

Q. What, in your opinion, is the effect of prohibitory laws upon the effi- 
ciency of moral means. Does prohibitory legislation aid or retard the moral 
agencies employed for the suppression of intemperance. 

A. I am hardly able to answer that. I think that the prohibitory law, so 
far as my observation goes, has had a tendency to increase drunkenness, but 
whether religious principles are so strongly, or so effectively urged or not, I 
am not able to say. For my own part, I depend more upon religious princi- 
ples, and the appeal to religious feeling, than on the statute. 

Q. Are the moral means now employed — such as addresses, lectures, &c. — 
less or greater in number than they were ten or fifteen years ago ? 

A. It appears to me that there has been less of such means employed 
than formerly. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) As a general theory, would your church, as a 
church, keep all questions of regulation, so far at least as social duties and 
general regulation of conduct are concerned, within its own hand, rather than 
remit such regulation in any way to the State ? 

A. Our theory is to obey the law, and we hold it to be our duty to teach 
our children to obey the law. 

Q. You are a minority in the country ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Would you, as a matter of church theory, — as a matter of polity, — if 
you were numerous, and in the majority, regard these duties as duties properly 
interfered with by law ? 

A. In this country, where there is no established religion, I do not think 
that the church would be forward to appeal to the State in the matter. 



320 APPENDIX. 

Q. As a general theory, your church is opposed to appeals to the State for 
any aid in such cases ? 

A. I do not understand your question fully. 

Q. My question was, whether in general, resting alone upon your church 
polity, you would invoke the aid of the State at all, in regard to these general 
matters ? 

A. We seek protection as do other persuasions; we are bound to sus- 
tain the laws of the country, but we do not connect our ecclesiastical rules 
with the statute. 

Q. You regard this as a concession, under the state of things in this 
country ? Does it grow out of the genius of your church polity, or is it a 
concession to the existing state of things in this country ? 

A. I think that our church has no greater affinity for an established 
religion than any other. 

Q. My question is understood a little more broadly than I intended. I 
intended to ask, not, whether you desired an established religion, but whether 
the genius of your church government recognizes the need of the aid of the 
law in the management of social evils ? 

A. Perhaps not in the enforcement of moral or religious duties. 

Q. My question is a little broader than that and referring to general 
social evils. 

A . So far as that goes, we adhere to the government of the country, and 
teach our children obedience to the laws. 

Q. I regret that the precise point of the question does not appear. My 
question is simply this : whether,, resting upon your church polity, and follow- 
ing its genius, you would invoke the aid of the State in the suppression of 
social evils ; I refer more particularly to such matters as drunkenness, adultery, 
gambling ? 

A. We have no objection to laws against crime of any kind, and we 
teach obedience to them. 

Q. But would you establish such laws if the polity of your church could 
assert itself ? 

A. I do not see any tendency in that direction. I do not know. 

Q. You have been an active participant in the labors of the friends of 
temperance, in the city of Lowell, for many years ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state upon what basis, and in what form, 
you have labored ? 

A. I have preached upon the subject. I have attended and taken part in 
public meetings, but more in the earlier period of what is called the reforma- 
tion, than recently. 

Q. Your own basis of action, was the exclusion of distilled liquors 
alone ? 

A. My memory does not quite serve me, to answer that. 

Q. Has it been your practice of late to affiliate with those who take the 
ground of total abstinence ? 

A. I have not attended the public meetings since that position was 
assumed. 



APPENDIX. 321 

Testimony of Rev. B. F. Clark. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Will you state any conclusions that you may have 
formed, from your own observations, in regard to the subject of intemperance V 
A. My manner of life in respect to temperance, is, I suppose, very well 
known to you, since the year that we both lived in Lowell, and when you and 
others were very actively engaged in using what I regarded as appropriate 
means of carrying forward the temperance reform, which, I assert, was in . a 
very much better condition then than it is now. 
Q. How much better ? 

A. It was better in this respect : I believe the laws then in force were suc- 
cessfully used to promote the temperance cause. From a very careful inves- 
tigation of this subject, and from conversations with men who have the means 
of knowing of what they speak, I believe that a very much larger proportion 
of the inhabitants of Lowell at that time, abstained from the use of intoxicat- 
ing drinks, than now. Then, side-boards were generally laid aside ; now they 
are common. Then, the upper classes of society did not pass wine around at 
their parties ; now they generally do. I believe that those were emphatically 
years of promise. I became a prohibitionist by adopting what I now consider 
to be an erroneous opinion : — that a prohibitory law would stop the sale of 
intoxicating drinks, and thereby remove the evils of intemperance. 

Q. What, in your observation, has been the effect of the prohibitory law ? 
A. I think that the effect of the prohibitory law has been disastrous to the 
cause of temperance. I believe the law has proved a failure, because I find tha 
the habit of excessive drinking is unabated, and, in many places, those habits 
are increasing among the poorer classes and among the young. I find, also, from 
careful observation, that the sale of intoxicating drinks is not abated nor essen- 
tially lessened ; that the sales by open retail under the license law, are now more 
than made up by sales to families, and sales to drinking-clubs ; so that the 
amount of actual drinking and drunkenness, the suppression of which was 
aimed at by the law, has not decreased. If by law we prohibit entirely the sale 
of intoxicating drinks, but find that liquor is still sold and used, that drunken- 
ness does not diminish, I claim that such a law has proved a failure. 

Q. Under your own observation, is there far more intemperance or less ; 
far greater sale of intoxicating liquors or less, than there was at the time of 
which you spoke ? 

A. From my own observations, and from what I have learned from others, 
on inquiry, I believe that there is more ; and I believe that we are fast going 
back to the habits of our fathers, in regard to the use of intoxicating drinks. 

Q. What is the fact, since the operation of the prohibitory law, in regard 
to the use of moral means in effecting a temperance reform ? 

A. When this law came into operation in 1855, 1 was actively engaged, 
and I know that moral means were generally laid aside. I know that we 
had been accustomed to having frequent lectures on temperance in our place ; 
they were discontinued, and we ceased to circulate temperance literature as 
we had done previously. There was then a general feeling that the law was 
a machine by which the work was to be done. 

Q. Since that time, within the sphere of your observation, such efforts 
have greatly diminished ? 
41 



322 APPENDIX. 

A. They were greatly diminished, but, within a year or two, have been 
revived. 

Q. What is the present condition of the temperance reform, promoted by 
such means, compared with what it used to be ? 

A. The interest in the subject is reviving, but in a different form. There 
is now a division ; the temperance people are divided and arrayed against 
each other ; and those who are now active temperance men are exceedingly 
denunciatory towards those who do not come fully up to their level. 

Q. So far as you are able to judge, are the temperance people throughout 
the Commonwealth generally united, or divided ? 

A . They are divided. Men who were then actively engaged in the tem- 
perance cause, because they cannot adopt all the measures of those who now 
take the lead in this matter, have ceased to go with them. Personally, I have 
never done so much for the cause of total abstinence ; never worked so system- 
atically through the children and young people, as during the last three or 
four years ; but I have ceased to act with others with whom I formerly acted. 

Q. Is liquor now sold in your town ; or is the law enforced ? 

A. In our village — North Chelmsford — there is now no place where it is 
openly sold. There was a tavern kept there ; a man hired a place for a year, 
but was not the right sort of a man in the opinion of the neighborhood, and 
left a month ago, and that house is now shut up. I am credibly informed 
that liquor is sold in our village in private houses. I have heard of three or 
four different places where it is sold, and I have reason to believe that it is 
brought in there very freely in wagons and sleighs, and used or sold privately. 

Q. What is the population of your village ? 

A. About seven hundred. 

Q. How is it in other portions of the town ? 

A. I understand that in the centre of the town it is not sold. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You spoke of moral efforts having been abated 
when this law was enacted ? 

A. I did. 

Q. Did such abatement commence directly on the passage of the law ? 

A. So far as my recollection now goes, it commenced before this law 
passed. This law passed in 1852 ; the prohibitory law of Maine was passed 
in 1848, and we then began to talk about having it in this State. The abate, 
ment commenced about the time that the Maine Law was enacted, and we 
began to talk about similar legislation in our own Commonwealth. 

Q. Are you sure that the Maine Law was passed in 1848 ? 

A. I have been told that 1848 was the year. 

Q. I am quite sure that it was passed in 1850. 

A. And i" am quite sure that it was passed in 1848. 

Q. Did not this relaxation of moral effort commence a good while before 
that? 

A. No, sir ; it did not commence until we began to talk about prohibition. 

Q. Did we not talk about prohibition a good while before that ? 

A. Not in this form. 

Q. But do you not know that prohibition was attempted a great many 
years before that ? 



APPENDIX. 323 

A. I know that in 1810 licenses were withheld very generally throughout 
the State. The withholding of licenses was a kind of prohibition, but it was 
not satisfactory to the prohibitionists, and they began to talk about a real 
prohibitory law. 

Q. Do you not know that the law, in many places in this State, was more 
thoroughly prohibitory than the present, inasmuch as it did not permit the sale 
of ardent spirits for medicine or for the arts ? Don't you know that ? 

A. I do. 

Q. What more thorough law of prohibition could you have than that ? 

A. It was prohibitory in that case. 

Q. Was it not in every case ? 

A . It was a very weak law. 

Q, But was it not strongly prohibitory ? 

A. No, sir ; because licenses were not universally withheld throughout the 
State at any one time. 

Q. They were withheld in Boston ? 

A. They were, but liquor-selling went on all the time. 

Q. Was not the law then prohibitory in Boston ? 

A. Indirectly, by the withholding of licenses it was prohibitory. 

Q. The people refused to give licenses ; therefore the effect of their action 
was prohibitive ? 

A. I grant that. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Was not the burden of our discussion, from 1844 to 
1848, the necessity of a law conforming to the conditions of the present law ? 

A. No, sir; not at so early a period. I remember very well when Mr. 
Spooner came to our place and spoke in opposition to a prohibitory law. I 
heard him make some very eloquent speeches on the subject. 

Mr. Spooner. It was in 1843 or 1844 that I became an advocate of 
prohibition. 

A. You did not advocate it when you came to our town. I remember 
that you spoke very eloquently against it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You claim that when this prohibitory law was 
passed that there was a relaxation of moral effort? 

A. Yes, sir ; and before the law was passed in this State. 

Q. Do you not know that directly after the Washingtonian movement, 
moral efforts were relaxed, if not suspended, to a great degree, and that since 
that time ministers have scarcely preached upon the subject of temperance, 
until very recently ? 

A. I do not know that fact, but I do know the fact that I have stated. I 
can clearly trace the laying aside of moral means to the talk of prohibition. 

Q. Do you recollect the examination before the Legislature, two years 
ago? 

A. I do, very distinctly. 

Q. What period did the testimony then offered, show to be the highest 
point of temperance ? 

A. Between 1845 and 1850. 

Q. Did not Mr. Child say, that in his judgment, it was about 1845 ? 



324 APPENDIX. 

A. I have forgotten that. I recollect that in comparing the testimony, the 
Committee said that it culminated between 1845 and 1850. 

Q. Was liquor sold in 1845 and 1848, in the town where you now reside ? 

A. It has been sold ever since I have been there, and is sold there now. 

Q. Was there, an open sale there ? 

A. We have, as we supposed, at several different times, stopped the open 
sale of liquor in that town. We did not, however, suppress drunkenness, for 
we are very near to Lowell, and it would be brought in from there and sold in 
large quantities. 

Q. How was the sale stopped for those short periods ? 

A. By prosecutions 

Testimony of H. W. B. Wightman. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In North Chelmsford. 

Q. What is your business ? 

A. I am Treasurer of the Chelmsford Foundry Company. 

Q. You have a large number of men in your employ ? 

A. We have employed from seventy-five to two hundred men in our 
foundry during the last sixteen years ? 

Q. What has been your observation in regard to the working of the 
prohibitory liquor law ? 

A. I was in favor of the prohibitory law for quite a number of years, until 
I found that for some reason it was inoperative. For the last two or three 
years I have been in doubt as to its practicability. So far as the sale of 
liquor to our men is concerned, I do not think that it has diminished at all. 
The nature of the business is such, that for years past the proprietors of 
foundries have been accustomed to furnish their men with a certain amount 
of liquor. I recollect very distinctly, that in my earlier days it was always 
customary to give to each man who worked in a foundry a half-pint of liquor 
per day, and charge him with the balance used. Some of the old men who 
are employed, and who have been there for over a quarter of a century, still 
continue their habitual use of liquor. They drink it regularly, and, as far as 
their appearance is concerned, I cannot see that the habit grows upon them. 
Some of the young men who are in the foundry, and who were in the army, 
I think contracted the habit there, because I know that many of them were 
formerly members of temperance societies, and some of them had taken the 
pledge. Not only have those who were in the army contracted the habit of 
drinking, but some of their companions who were not in the war have also 
become addicted to the use of liquor within the last year or two. I think that 
there has been no difficulty at all in procuring liquor. It may not always be 
obtained in our place, but Lowell is but three and a half miles distant, and 
there are ample facilities for procuring liquor from either Lowell or Boston. 
I think that the habit of drinking has not diminished. 

Q. Has it increased ? 

A. I do not know, so far as the number of men are concerned, that it has 
increased ; but among the class of whom I spoke — the young men who were 
in the army, and their companions — I think that there has been an increase. 



APPENDIX. 325 

Q. Will you be kind enough to compare the social habits of families, as 
they were twenty years ago, with the social habits of the people of the present 
time? 

A. I think that wines and liquors are used more universally now than they 
were twenty years ago, although I never have it passed to me. I never took 
a glass of intoxicating liquor as a beverage in my life. 

Q. Are there any public places in your town where liquor is sold ? 

A. I have no knowledge except by public report, but I think that there 
are two or three places where liquor can be procured. 

Q. Are those places known to be public ? Docs everybody know where 
they are? 

A. I think that anybody who desires liquor can obtain it. 

Q. What is your knowledge as to the private or secret sale of liquor ? 

A. Some three or four months ago, one of our men became intoxicated by 
procuring liquor in the village, and the day before Thanksgiving, fell, with his 
face in a brook, and was found next morning, frozen to death. The State 
Constabulary were asked to come to the place, and shut up certain places that 
were mentioned ; they did not come at that time, but a month or six weeks 
afterwards, one of the State Constabulary was there, and so far as the open 
sale was concerned in one or two of those places I think it was discontinued. 

Q. Have any other places sprung up in place of those suppressed ? 

A. I think not. Mr. Clark mentioned a tavern-keeper who was com- 
plained of two or three months ago. The temperance people thought that 
they had witnesses who would be sure to convict him, but I believe that not 
one of the witnesses who were called testified that they had procured liquor of 
him, and he was discharged. There were three or four men connected with 
the foundry who were witnesses in that case. 

Testimony of Rev. B. F. Clark, ( continued.) 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How long have you been publicly engaged in 
this effort to procure a license law ? 

A. My first public effort was made three years ago last June. For the last 
three years I have issued a yearly message to the people for the purpose of 
bringing the people up to that standard, and have been here before the 
legislature. 

Q. Are you a professional license-seeker ? 

A. What do you mean by " professional ? " 

Q. You have followed it up pretty steadily ? 

A . Yes, sir, and I intend to follow it up until I accomplish the end. 

Q. Are you pretty well backed up, with respect to funds ? 

A. I will say, in answer to that, that I commenced this effort entirely 
alone, confidently believing that I could persuade the public to come up to 
my standard, and I took the money out of my own pocket. 

Q. Do you mean to say that all the money that you have expended in 
this effort has been taken out of your own pocket, or have friends aided you ? 

A. I commenced taking the money out of my own pocket, and without 
having a dollar pledged, I continued doing so, until I had expended several 
hundred dollars. I have put into these annual messages what I was doing ; 



326 APPENDIX. 

I have given my post office address, and stated that those who were friendly 
to this movement might furnish me with funds, if they saw fit to do so. I 
have never called upon anybody for money, but different persons in different 
places have secured funds for me. I have received aid from a great variety 
of sources. 

Q. I wanted to show, that you are under the natural bias of a person who 
has taken up an object, and that you are pursuing it as other people would. 

A. That is a false inference from the facts. Never, in my life, (and I say 
it with the solemnity of an oath,) did I undertake anything with a more 
self-sacrificing spirit, or in a more confident belief that I was engaged in 
doing a great and a good work for the public. I have made sacrifices ; one 
thousand dollars, placed in my hand to-day, would not repay what I have 
expended. I know no " natural bias," but a bias for tbe truth. 

Q. Do you know whether any of the money that you have received came 
from traffickers in ardent spirits ? 

A. I have said that any class of persons might contribute, and I will say 
here, that I am ready to receive aid in carrying on this work from any class 
of persons, whether engaged in the liquor business, or in any other business. 
I will receive it even from Mr. Spooner ! I have not looked a gift horse in 
the mouth. Those who have brought money to me were very respectable 
persons indeed. I will say now that if any person in this room will give me 
fifty dollars, I will not ask him where he got it, but I will pledge myself to use 
it faithfully in carrying on this great work. 

Testimony of Rev. J. C. Lovejoy. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are a clergyman, I believe ? 

A . I was for twenty years, but have not been for the last few years. 

Q. What observations have you made in regard to the effects of this 
prohihitory law ? 

A. In the autumn of 1851 1 received a circular from some committee in 
Boston, asking me to go out and lecture in favor of a prohibitory law, similar 
to the Maine Law. I examined the subject, and came to the conclusion that 
there was no soil in the community into which the tap-root of a prohibitory 
law couli strike. There was no basis for such a law. In the first place, I 
thought that I had no right to dictate to another man what he should eat or 
what he should drink. God had given each man the capacity, certainly the 
right, to say what was good for him to eat and drink, if he had any rights at all. 
In the second place, there was one feature in the law, which, when viewed in 
the light of justice, appeared to me decidedly wrong, — absolutely wrong ; it 
was the punishment of one man for the sin of another. Another principle 
appeared to me wrong, — that was the destruction of property wantonly. The 
prohibitory laws pours alcohol upon the ground, — a species of property that is 
immediately replaced by the production of more alcohol. However adulterated 
or impure the liquor may be, it can always be distilled and saved. If I looked 
to my own conscience for a foundation for this law, I found none there ; if 
I looked to the Scriptures, I found that this law was in direct opposition to them. 
The law takes it for granted that wine is one of the intoxicating drinks ; that it is 
noxious, and that therefore it is a sin to drink it. The Old Testament is full of 



APPENDIX. 327 

blessings upon wine and corn and oil. The first miracle of the Founder of 
Christianity was to make and distribute on a festive occasion — a large quantity 
of wine — not less, according to Trench, than one hundred and twenty- 
eight gallons, — alcoholic wine — fermented wine ; yet if that miracle were 
to-day repeated in Boston, this law would charge the Saviour with a crime, 
and imprison Him. I, therefore, preached a sermon against the law, instead 
of in favor of it, from this text, — " Moreover the law entered, that the offence 
might abound." It is fifteen years since then, but this day, according to the 
testimony given here, is this Scripture fulfilled. During the last two or three 
years, I have travelled extensively all over New England, and I must say, 
that, in my opinion, this law, in its operation, is very unjust and cruel to land- 
lords. A landord is compelled by necessity to furnish his guests, or a major- 
ity of them, with some kind of stimulants. If he does it, he is seized by the 
law ; if he does not do it, he is tormented by his customers. It seems to me 
there ought to be some relief for this class of persons. Another reason 
why such a law should never have been enacted, is that it is utterly impossible 
to enforce it. Two men were put in jail, and allowed molasses as a ration ; 
they saved it up for several days, and then by means of a tea-kettle, distilled 
the molasses and got drunk. Now if any person in his senses, can expect to 
reduce the whole community to closer quarters than that, " God must give 
him another reason, or else cure me of mine." It is impossible, in my mind, 
and utterly undesirable. I consider the law not only wrong, but absolutely 
wicked, and a stigma upon the State as long as it is upon the statute book. It 
censures a person for doing just what Christ daily did, for He acknowledged 
that He was a wine-bibber. He consecrated it at His Last Supper as an ever- 
lasting memorial of his love, and gave it to us as one of the ingredients of 
our diet, and, as has been testified to in regard to the European countries, to 
keep us from getting anything noxious. Of this I have no more doubt than I 
have that I live. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you regard the Scripture of the Old Testament, 
where a blessing is pronounced upon the corn, and wine, and oil, as an injunc- 
tion to profit by the use of wine ? 

A. I consider them all to be put upon a par, — that the wine is as good as 
the oil, and the oil as good as the corn. 

Q. You think, then, that Scripture conclusively proves that to abolish 
wine would be to do harm ? 

A. Just as much as to abolish corn. 

Q. But what has become of the oil ? 

A. Of what oil? 

Q. The oil of that text. 

A. I do not perceive the point; if there is one I cannot see it. 

Q. Well, I do not. 1 do not see the oil nor what has become of it. 

A. I suppose it is in Palestine as plentiful as the wine. 

Q. Is it now a daily article of use for anointing the body, as it was 
formerly ? 

A. Whether it is or is not, does not matter. It was not an injunction to 
use it, but a blessing upon it. I think a great many men would be better if 
they were anointed with it. 



328 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you not know perfectly well that that Scripture is in no sense to be 
construed as a warrant for the use of either of those articles, but that it is a 
reference to articles of common use, as symbols of the Divine blessing ? 

A. I know they were real blessings. 

Q. Can you prove it from the Scriptures ? 

A. I can, to my satisfaction. 

Q. Do you regard our Saviour's reference, " Ye cannot serve God and 
mammon," as a proof that the Lydian god of riches was a genuine God ? 

A . Of course not. 

Testimony of Hon. James H. Duncan. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A . Haverhill. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to inform the Committee whether the prohib- 
itory law is enforced in Haverhill, so far as open places are concerned. Are 
there any open places ? 

A . I should think that at the present time there were not any open places 
in Haverhill ; though from what I see, and from the effects, I have no doubt 
that there are a great many places where liquors are privately sold. I have 
very little personal knowledge of places where liquor is sold or where it is 
drank. My knowledge is from information from others and my own obser- 
vation in passing about town in the streets. 

Q. Does your town patronize the State Agent in Boston ? 

A. I find, sir, by the report of our town agent, that his sales amounted to 
about $33,000 last year. 

Q. What is the population of the town ? 

A. The population of the town is between eleven and twelve thousand. 
I do not know exactly. 

Q. Are your people peculiarly sick ? 

A. No, sir; they are as healthy, I presume, as in other places in the 
County of Essex or in the State. 

Q. Any peculiar epidemic last summer ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. During the past year, would not the State Constabulary have found 
places to close up, if they had visited Haverhill ? 

A . They have been there, as I understand, and have closed a number 
of places, though not all of the places where liquor is said to have been sold. 

Q. How is the fact at present as to intemperance or drunkenness in 
Haverhill ? 

A. My observation and conviction are that temperance has not been pro- 
moted by the prohibitory law ; that the temperance of our people is not so 
good now as it was before the passage of the law ; and there were periods 
when I took a somewhat active part in the promotion of temperance, acting 
upon a committee to prevent the illegal sale of intoxicating spirits ; and atone 
time we had almost prevented it throughout the town. That was fifteen 
years ago, or perhaps more. I would state here that Haverhill labors under 
this disadvantage : that a person who had been in the habit of keeping a grog- 
shop, when an attempt was made to enforce a prohibitory law, went just over 



APPENDIX. 329 

the State line into New Hampshire, erected one or two buildings, and kept an 
open groggery there ; so that any one by going a distance of two miles and a 
half, could get a supply ; and probably a. great deal comes in from that source. 
The law in New Hampshire, or in that part of it, I believe is not strictly 
enforced. 

Q. What opinions from your observation have you formed in regard to 
the efficacy of the prohibitory law in checking intemperance and the evils that 
result from it ? 

A . I think, sir, it has been entirely inoperative, and productive rather of 
mischief than of good. My reflection led me to think when it was passed that 
it was an unwise act, and I believed that it could never be enforced ; and that, 
whenever it was attempted to be enforced upon the large dealers and the 
hotels, it would produce an opposition that would end in the repeal of the law, 
and of all laws on the subject, and would create a feeling of opposition in the 
State that would destroy the law and break down all law on the subject. 
That opinion is grounded on this conviction r that there never has been a 
time when the majority of the people of the State were not in the habit of 
using some of these liquors, — wine, ale or beer, which are prohibited under 
this law. I say it with all respect to the Legislature, that I do not believe 
that there ever was a time when a majority of those who composed a Legis- 
lature and passed a law, were, in their individual opinions and consciences, 
in favor of the law ; and I believe it is impossible in the government of a country 
like ours, to execute a law that is not sustained by public opinion. It was 
greatly at variance with the habits, and, as people thought, with the rights 
of the community, to include ale and cider, inasmuch as cider had been made 
and drank throughout all the farming population of the State ; and it is impos- 
sible by legislative act to make that a crime which is not made a crime by the 
Divine law. Now, while the Divine word condemns the abuse of any of these 
things, if I understand it aright, it does not prohibit the temperate use ; and 
again, the law makes it a crime in an expressman to transport any of these 
articles, and subjects him to fine and imprisonment, when, if he had refused 
before the passage of this law to have carried anything of the kind, he would 
have been condemned and thrown out of his occupation. I think it is impos- 
sible to make that a crime which is not made a crime by the Divine law. 
Then, sir, there is another very great objection to this prohibitory law ; which 
is, that it divides the friends of temperance, and thereby weakens their efforts. 
A few friends of temperance were ardent advocates of the prohibitory law, and 
many of them have seen fit to censure and condemn those who had previously 
acted with them because they did not come up to that point. That is a well- 
known fact ; and in consequence of that those in this Commonwealth who are 
desirous of producing the best results in a great degree abstain from putting 
forth their efforts. That, sir, I think, a very marked reason why intemperance 
has to some extent prevailed. Then I think that it is another objection to the 
prohibitory law, that it demoralizes the community. Who believes that the 
thirty-three thousand dollars' worth sold at the agency in Haverhill, (probably 
in very small quantities, and no one doubts that in every instance this was 
said to be wanted for medicinal and mechanical purposes,) were bought for 
those purposes in the proper meaning of the terms ? Then what a vast 
4£ 



330 APPENDIX. 

amount of lying has been occasioned through this agency ! Another objection 
is this : there is a large class of men who call themselves temperance men, who 
sometimes desire, if they go into an eating-house, to drink a glass of ale ; but 
it creates a very unpleasant feeling to think that a man is breaking the law, 
and that he is aiding and abetting another man in breaking the law. I think 
it is. impossible to carry out this law until a change takes place in the public 
mind, which I never expect to see take place at all. I never expect to see 
the time when a majority of the people of this Commonwealth will sustain the 
prohibitory law. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that thirty-three thousand dollars' worth 
of liquor was sold by the State agency last year ? 

A. It so appears by report. 

Q. Do you not know that a great deal of that is used in the mechanic 
arts ? 

A. I should say so. 

Q. Do you know what proportion of the alcohol manufactured in this 
country is used in the arts ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. Did you know that it was over half ? 

A. I do not know that; I have no recollection about it. 

Q. Do you recollect that one manufacturing establishment in Lowell used 
one hundred thousand gallons in a year ? 

A. I do not, sir. 

Q. Do you know what kinds of liquors the agent in your town sells ? 

A. I have not examined them. He keeps a great variety of all kinds of 
articles that are drank. 

Q. Have you had the same agent a number of years ? 

A. I think this gentleman has been agent about two years. 

Q. They have confidence in him or they would not trust him, I suppose ? 

A . He represents his liquor to be an assayed article. 

Q. What is the population of your town ? 

A . Between eleven and twelve thousand ; and on the other side of the 
river in Bradford there are about a thousand more. 

Q. Do you know what the sales were a few years ago ? 

A. They are larger this year than ever before. 

Q. Do you know the cause ? 

A. The increasing use of liquor is attributable, I suppose, to the increase 
of intemperance. I would mention here an evil which is stated to me. I do 
not know it of my own knowledge, but I had it from creditable testimony, 
that there are a number of places in Haverhill where rooms are fitted up and 
furnished and large numbers of persons have keys where they can go in and 
get liquor. 

Q. Does this agency sell to other towns ? 

A. I do not know, but I should think they probably did. It is difficult for 
an agent to know where all the people come from who buy liquor of him, I 
suppose. It is very likely that they do. 

Q. Do you not attribute the increase of this sale to a considerable extent 
to the fact that the law has been pressing upon the liquor-dealers there ? 



APPENDIX. 331 

A. Well, to some extent, undoubtedly ; but it is only -within, I think, the 
last two or three months that the State Constabulary have made seizures. 

Q. But they made prosecutions more than a year ago ? 

A. There have, at different times, been prosecutions there. We had no 
constable at Haverhill, until within the last three or four months ; and the 
place was not, I think, visited by them until within the last three or four 
months. 

Q. Putting all these together, and considering the kinds of liquor sold, 
what do you suppose is the average price per gallon ? 

A. I could not tell. I have not # had occasion to go there to buy or to 
know anything about the prices, except that when I have asked the prices, 
I have understood that they were very high ; about three dollars a gallon, I 
believe. 

Q. What do you suppose the price of brandy is ? 

A . I have heard that they had it from four dollars up to twelve. 

Q. Would the prices average six dollars ? 

A . I should hardly think so much. There is another evil about this pro- 
hibitory law, which I will just mention as I understand it. These people who 
undertake to sell grog by the glass charge about twice as much as they did in 
former times ; therefore the temptation is to other persons to get small portions 
of liquor and retail it. I understand that Irish women are in the habit of 
keeping it for sale, and the Irish laborers on the aqueduct and elsewhere 
know where to go and get it just when they please, and where they please, 
almost. 

Q. There has been a great increase in intemperance ? 

A. Well, a considerable increase, sir; our population has increased, and, 
perhaps, it is more obvious on that account than it would have been formerly. 

Q. Is it not a much larger foreign population ? 

A . Yes, sir. The foreign population has been increasing. 

Q. Is your State Constable an active man in his office ? 

A. Yery efficient, I think. 

Q. You can give the amount of sales in your town ? 

A. I only know from the returns that the amount of sales is very much 
less. 

Q. Do you not think that it has been affected by the number of seizures ? 

A. It is only within a few months that seizures have been made. For 
a great many years after the prohibitory law was passed it was practically a 
dead letter. Now and then a temperance man would be alarmed as to the state 
of things and. commence prosecutions. They would commence and would 
prosecute under the Nuisance Act. It is very proper, if a person undertakes 
to sell liquor against the law, to enforce that law ; and it is certainly very 
desirable to stop dram-selling as much as possible. 

Q. Do you believe theoretically in abstaining from intoxicating drinks as 
a beverage ? 

A. I never have joined a total abstinence society. I do not think it is a 
duty. I do not think the sin is in the use, but in the abuse of these things. 

Q. Does not the moderate use of liquor tend to the abuse ? 



332 APPENDIX. 

A. It may, sir ; but it is one of the trials that we have to stand in this 
probationary state. 

Q. But do we not want to get rid of as many of the evils as possible ? 

A. I advocate a license law because I want to get rid of the evil of intem- 
perance as much as possible. 

Q. You see a very strenuous effort made now to get a license law since 
the State Constables have been doing their work. What influence behind 
that has led to this effort, in your opinion ? 

A . Well, sir ; it is that kind of restraint which is laid upon the community, 
a large portion of whom use these proHibited articles in some shape or other ; 
that kind of restraint they want to get rid of. They do not want, if a man 
chooses to have wine in his house, to subject a man to fine and imprisonment 
who sells that wine to him. He does not want to go and buy, when the man 
of whom he buys has no right to sell. It is a burden on the community that 
they want to throw off, I think. 

Q. Have you any question that the moving cause of this thing is from the 
liquor-dealers ? 

A. They probably are most active because their business is growing less 
by it. 

Q. Why do they move at all ? 

A. I suppose they would be glad to be enabled to sell without being 
constantly under the feeling that they were violating the law. 

Q. I would ask whether, in your opinion, the moving cause in this great 
effort for a license law, is not from the liquor-dealers in order to save their 
business ? 

A. Well, sir ; in answer to that question I would say that I have no 
knowledge on the subject. I have no sympathy of action with liquor-dealers. 
I have not to my knowledge had any conversation on this subject with men 
who are interested much in the sale of liquors. I should think it probable 
that they were the prominent party in the movement, because I have heard 
that they had a sort of State Alliance or State Society. I have read from 
the papers that there is an association existing among these liquor-dealers ; 
but a very large class of the persons who now sell liquors I should have no 
desire to have licensed if a license law were granted. 

Testimony of Frank Edson. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Hadley. 

Q. What is your business ? 

A. Broom manufacturer. 

Q. Have you any connection with the liquor agency ? 

A. I am the town agent, and have been for about a year and a half. 

Q. Will you state the general workings of that agency in your town ? 
Have you any memorandum or data that you can give ? 

A. I have made the statement repeatedly, that I do not think that one- 
tenth part of the liquor sold in our town is sold for legitimate purposes, 
and those to whom we do sell desire to get the cheapest kind ; and whenever 
we have endeavored to draw the thing down pretty close, there invariably 



APPENDIX. 333 

spring up other places. People even come in with wagons, and drive around 
and supply customers. Along through the summer we cut down to some 
extent, and about Thanksgiving we found that there were a good many sales, 
and we cut off one class of people entirely. That accounts for the number 
of sales being less ; but since then two other places have been opened. 

Q. What was the proportion of liquors which you have sold, which you 
think amounts to one-tenth ? 

A. I have drawn up a statement which shows the different kinds of liquors 
which have been sold by the agency. [See Report of State Liquor Agent.] 

Q. How i« it as to the state of temperance in your town ? 

A , I do not think that the state of temperance is in near as good condition 
as it was fifteen years ago, I see a great many more persons drunk now than 
I can remember of having seen when temperance went so far that the farmers 
cut down their cider apple trees. I think I see more drunkenness in Hadley 
in proportion than I see in Boston or New York. 

Q. What is the quality of the liquors furnished by the State Agency ? 

A. The liquors which are sent to us are said to be pure liquors. 

Q. Is it so ? 

A. Our people do not think so. I had an application on Monday last from 
persons that wanted that I should send to New York for some whiskey. I 
have whiskey in the cellar that I paid four dollars for, and I have another 
brand which costs six dollars and a half; but I can buy better liquor in Boston 
and New York of a respectable dealer for a great deal less money ; in fact, I 
know I can buy that which gives better satisfaction. 

Q. Is that the general impression in regard to the quality of the liquors 
from the town agency ? 

A. It is universally considered that anything that comes from the agency 
is not fit to use, I believe. Whether it is said from prejudice or from actual 
judgment, of course I do not know. 

Q. Do you sell any wine ? 

A. Very little wine. 

Q. Do you know where it is furnished for the communion table ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. It is not furnished by you ? 

A . No, sir, it is not. I do not know but the farmers themselves make it 
in some eases. There have been cases, also > where liquor has been sent by 
express and consigned to me. 

Q. To your knowledge? 

A. Not until after it was done. 

Q. Did the parties who got it ? 

A. Sometimes they did, and sometimes they did not. 

Q. The mode of getting the liquor by sending it to you, how extensive is 
it? 

A. It is not very extensive in my case ; no very great amount. 

Q. How is it in regard to the number of secret places for sale of liquor in 
your town ? 

A. There are no secret places in Hadley that would be called respectable 
places. 



334 APPENDIX. 

Q. Are there any which are not respectable ? 

A. I have reason to believe that there are three within half a mile of me. 
I know that there is plenty of it somewhere. I have men about me who 
occasionally have been in the habit of having a spree ; I do not see but that 
they have their sprees as often as they ever did ; and I do not find a man that 
is respectable that sells them a drop ; but they get it somewhere. 

Q. Do you know anything about the habits of people in reference to the 
use of liquor for convivial purposes ? 

A. I believe there is more liquor drank among respectable families in 
Hadley than there was fifteen years ago. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You speak of an increase of drunkenness gener- 
ally. Is that the case with the farmers ? 

A. No, sir, not generally. 

Q. Has there been any deterioration among them ? 

A. No, sir, I do not know that there has. 

Q. What class do you refer to ? 

A. There is a large class of Irish people who use liquors. 

Q. Have you any confidence in moral suasion on that class? 

A. I think I have as much as upon any other. 

Q. But they are the class of people that have the sprees which you speak 
of, are they not ? 

A. No, sir, there is not a great many of them ; but they have their sprees 
as much as they ever did, as far as I can see. 

Q. The drunkenness is among this class, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir ; but what I mean to say is that the better families make more 
use of it than they did formerly. 

Q. Do you always ask the question whether those who purchase of you are 
going to use it for medicinal purposes ? 

A. I do unless I am positive that the people are all right. 

Q. Have you reason to think that the people claim it falsely ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think that I have reason to think so. 

Q. You do not think the quantity you sell is large ? 

A. No, sir ; the quantity is less than at anytime since the agency has been 
established. 

Q. Do you not think that, when liquor is carried about in carts and by 
expressmen, a license law is likely to make the consumption of it greater ? 

A. I do not know as it will make it any greater. I think that where 
there is such a trade as that, people will get a jug full and take it into their 
houses, and drink more than they would if they were to go into a place where 
it was sold and get a drink and go along. 

Q. What is your observation on that point ? Can you affirm that as a 
matter of fact ? 

A. I do not know that I can affirm it as a fact any more than that. There 
is another evil springing up in our vicinity, and that is the establishing of 
club-rooms. 

Q, Are there any in your town ? 

A. I do not know that there are in our own town. 



APPENDIX. . 335 

Q. Was your remark that not one-tenth part of the liquor sold in your 
town was sold by yourself ? 

A. I said that it was not my opinion that one-tenth of it was used as the 
law intended that it should be. 

Q. You do not mean to sell otherwise than for medicines ? 

A. Certainly not. 

Q. When liquors are consigned to you which come by express, do you 
seize them and hold them ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you ever claim them ? 

A. I have told the persons that I did not like it ; that it was not the square 
way of doing business. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What do you mean by those club-rooms ? 

A. I mean that there are several in Northampton that I know of. < 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Are you a member of one ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you a total abstainer ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do they have liquor in those club-rooms ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Testimony of Mayor J. H. Perry. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What position do you hold in New Bedford ? 

A. Mayor of the city. 

Q. Will you state the general workings of the prohibitory law in New 
Bedford? 

A. I think it has not answered what it was supposed it would do by its 
friends. I cannot tell you how much worse it would have been if it had not 
been enforced. I am satisfied that things are bad enough as they are. 

Q. How is it as to intemperance, compared with what it was several years 
ago? 

A. I do not know that it has diminished any; I cannot say that it is on 
the increase. 

Q. Does it prevail among certain classes ? 

A. It does. 

Q. How is it as to the ability of the authorities to enforce the law, so that 
people may not get the means of intoxication ? 

A. So far as the city authorities are concerned, it was found impracticable 
a few years since, as evidence could not be found to convict. For that reason, 
it has been left to the State officers. 

Q. How is it as to the effect of the efforts of the State officers, as to 
checking intemperance ? 

A. I do not think it has checked it. 

Q. How is it as to the places, secret or open, where it is sold ; have they 
been checked ? 

A. I suppose there are a great many places where it is sold, but that is not 
a matter under my charge. The Chief of Police of our city is here, and can 
answer on that point better than I can. 



336 APPENDIX. 

Q. What are your views as to the comparative benefits of the present pro- 
hibitory law as compared with a law which should regulate the sale under 
restrictions ; that is, which should allow persons to sell under the control of 
the mayor and aldermen of cities, with power of revocation ? Which system 
do you think would tend to check intemperance most ? 

A. I cannot tell what the practical results would be. So far as the result 
now is we have no effect at all. I think if some other law were tried, then 
the authorities might have some charge over the inhabitants. 

Q. What is the sentiment of the people of New Bedford, men of respecta- 
bility and character and influence, and the men who exert influence in other 
matters ? 

A. I must speak without statistics. I think the majority would sustain a 
change in the law. I am not prepared to say what. 

Q. Is there an influence that would enable any authority to enforce the 
law, so as to check the sale of liquors ? Is there a public sentiment against 
the law ? 

A. I think it is against it, because it has been tried and not sustained. 

Q. Have you seen anything of the effect of closing up places of sale, under 
the Nuisance Act ; whether it closes all the places of sale or whether it checks 
intemperance ? 

A. I judge from what I see in our police courts. I do not think it has 
been checked. 

Testimony of Oliver M. Brownell. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside, sir ? 

A. New Bedford. 

Q. What position do you hold there at the present time ? 

A. City Marshal. 

Q. How is it as to the general effect, so far as comes under your observa- 
tion, of the working of the present prohibitory law, in checking intemperance 
and the sale of liquor in improper places ? 

A. It has closed up the places of public sale. There are no places there 
where liquor is sold in public. 

Q. How is the effect upon intemperance or drunkenness ? 

A. I think that is just about the same. 

Q. You have as many cases now as before they were closed ? 

A. No, we do not have quite so many, and we do not have so many crimes 
of other kinds ; it is about in proportion to the other crimes. 

Q. I would inquire of you, sir, if there are places where it is sold notwith- 
standing the public sale is closed ? 

A . Yes, sir ; a great many places where it is sold privately. 

Q. What is the character of those places ? 

A. It is from high to low ; from hotels down to private families. 

Q. Do the hotels which have ostensibly stopped the sale continue to sell, 
do you think ? 

A. I have no doubt of it. 

Q. How is it as to the eating-houses ? 

A. They sell. 



APPENDIX. 337 

Q. Is the sale about the same as ever it was ? Can anybody that is known 
by them to be of the right stamp get liquor ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is their scale ? 

A. They know the men they are selling to. They do not sell to strangers 
unless by introduction of some one that knows of them. 

Q. Can intemperate persons get it there ? 

A. I presume they can ; though a person that is likely to be taken up for 
drunkenness, cannot get it easily. 

Q. How is it as to this matter of disclosure ? Will these persons disclose 
where they get their liquor ? 

A. Some of them do. 

Q. The greater proportion ? 

A. It is very seldom that they will disclose at all. I believe there has 
been one this season, since the first of January ; but it is very seldom that 
they get one to disclose. 

Q. If those persons are well understood as to character, is there any 
difficulty in getting from these places where it is understood that they are 
closed up ? 

A. None at all. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say there is no open sale in New Bedford ? 

A. No public bar-room, I mean by that. 

Q. Has there been a time within a few years when there was ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When there was an opportunity for anybody to buy it ? 

A. Unless he was a man that was likely to get drunk. 

Q. Bo you sell it to all such now ? 

A. Yes, sir. - 

Q. I thought you said they would not sell to those whom they did not know ? 

A . They would not sell to those they did not know. 

Q. Two or three years ago they would not sell to those they did not know ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is that an improvement ? 

A. I have not said whether it was or not. I presume it is. 

Q. Can the State Constables get at it ? 

A. They would be likely to seize a small quantity. 

Q. Could you not get evidence if you set about it ? 

A. No, sir. It is more difficult to get evidence in a liquor case, than in 
anything I have anything to do with. 

Q. How long a time have the State Constables been in operation ? 

A. There is generally some one there all the time. 

Q. How early did they make prosecutions in New Bedford ? When was 
the first prosecution by the State Constabulary made there ? 

A. I cannot say exactly. I recollect going round to notify these places. 
I could not say how long it was before they prosecuted. Once in a week or 
two there would be two or three there. 

Q. Have they made any seizures ? 

A. Yes, sir ; some small seizures. 
43 



338 APPENDIX. 

Q. How many ? 

A. I think they have made three or four there of small quantities. 

Q. Are you in favor of a license law ? 

A. I am. 

Q. What sort of a license law would you have ? 

A. I would have a law that every city and town should license, if they 
saw fit, the hotels and eating-houses. 

Q. How many places would you license in New Bedford ? 

A. I would license the hotels and eating-houses* 

Q. How many would that be ? 

A . Probably twenty-five. 

Q. Would you not license any grocers to sell to families ? 

A. I should if they wanted a license. 

Q. Do not about all the grocers sell, more or less ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. How many grocers do you think sell in New Bedford ? 

A. Four or five, probably. 

Q. No more than four or five in New Bedford ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. What is your population there ? 

A. Twenty thousand, probably. 

Q. A very temperate community, is it not ? 

A. I consider it so. 

Q. Is the intemperance not confined to a few foreigners ? 

A. Well, it is mostly among the foreign .population. 

Testimony of Ex-Mayor Edward P. Buffington. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You reside in Fall River, do you not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you held any official position that has brought you in contact 
with the operation of the present liquor law ? 

A. I have, sir. 

Q. What is it? 

A. Mayor of the city. 

Q. What years ? 

A. The last seven preceding this. 

Q. Are you Mayor at the present time ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You were last year ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you give the Committee your observation in regard to the work- 
ings of this prohibitory liquor law, in checking intemperance and the improper 
sale of liquor ? 

A. My observation is that the law has not worked to reform the inebriate 
to the extent that the friends of the law, in my opinion, expected. 

Q. What has been the effect in checking the cases of intemperance or 
drunkenness ? 



APPENDIX. 339 

A. I cannot say that it has had any effect. I can merely state the ten- 
dency so far as the cause of temperance is concerned for the last three years. 
I would say that the arrests last year were 378 against 144 the year before. 
What the causes were, you must judge for yourselves. 

Q. Do you infer that the cases of intemperance were greater ? 

A. I do not know that any more stringent measures were taken to arrest 
persons, and I do not know there have been. We have supposed that we had 
a very efficient City Marshal. 

Q. How is it as to the number of places where liquors are procured ? 

A. I should think there were probably two or three hundred places where 
liquor is got in some way or another. 

Q. That has been diminished in the last year ? 

A. I am not prepared to judge. I can only state that most of the public 
places of the better class that did sell, have been forced, some of them, to close, 
and in the month when the largest amount of seizures was made the arrests 
for drunkenness were the largest of any in the year. 

Q. I would inquire your opinion as to the practicability, as things are, of 
enforcing in Fall River, the present prohibitory law, so as to check materially 
intemperance and the illegal sale of liquor ? 

A. Well, sir, I would say in reply to that, that I have no doubt that the 
State Constables may shut up now and then a place ; but we have a class of 
people there who will have it. What the effect is you can judge as well as 
lean. 

Q. Have you any opinions formed from your observation, as to whether 
any other system would aid the police authorities in checking this evil better 
than the present ? 

A. I have not, sir ; I have not given the matter any attention. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Did you make vigorous efforts during the seven 
years in which you were Mayor, to suppress the traffic ? 

A. I certainly did. The City Marshal and assistants had that under their 
charge as much as any other law. 

Q. Did yo* direct your officers to break down the traffic ? 

A. I would say that if I had been appointed an officer to prosecute the 
violations of the liquor law, I should have attended to it. I was appointed to 
executive duty. So far as the prosecutions were concerned it was the duty 
of the City Marshal. If he did not do his duty, it was only for me to examine 
whether or not he had accomplished what was for him to do. 

Q. Did you intend to hold him to a strict accountability on this subject? 

A. I do not think I did more than on any other. 

Q. Was it your desire to make the law efficient ? 

A. As much as any other law, so far as I know. 

Q. Have the moral efforts in behalf of temperance in Fall River been 
continued ? 

A. I do not know but they have. 

Q. Are you a total abstainer ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you think the population of your city are any better now in this 
respect than they were formerly ? 



340 APPENDIX. 

A. I think the condition is far better than it was when I was a boy, in 
proportion to the number. A large proportion of our people are of other 
nationalities, where they have been in the habit of using liquor. 

Testimony of Charles G. Davis. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Plymouth. 

Q. What position do you hold there ? 

A. I am United States Assessor for the First Congressional District, 
including Fall River, New Bedford, Barnstable County, Martha's Vineyard, 
Nantucket, about half of Bristol County, and about half of Plymouth County. 

Q. Was the number of licenses granted in your district the past year less 
than the year before ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think it was. I have given the figures to Mr. Clapp of this 
city, and no memorandum was kept of them. 

Q. Is there any reason why it has fallen off? 

A. Yes, sir ; two reasons, I think, are apparent. The first is that I find in 
my experience, that liquor-dealers had no objections to applying for what was 
then called a license, under the idea which was very prevalent at that time 
among them, that it might be a protection to them ; but at the time that the 
question, a year ago, was before the Supreme Court at Washington, they 
declined to apply for licenses any more. That was the principal reason why 
they did not apply for licenses ; and the efforts of the State Constabulary have 
added to the force of that reason. They do not wish the application for a 
license to be used against them, as was attempted to be done about that time 
before Judge Allen in one of the courts of this city. 

<2- Have you made any observations upon the effects of the present system 
of legislation upon the usages of society ? 

A. More as a man, perhaps, than as an officer. As a lawyer, having 
observation in the court, as a citizen, more especially in Plymouth, and as 
having occasion to be in New Bedford often, I have very decided opinions on 
the question. 

Q. Will you please to state your opinion ? 

A. I have no question in my own mind that the law does much more hurt 
than good. I think it is gradually poisoning those people who drink at all, by 
a poorer kind of liquor than would otherwise be had. Like rancid butter, 
spread out finer on the bread, it spoils more good bread. As we destroy the 
respectable dealers, many more of a poorer class, selling a much poorer liquor, 
spring up. That, I should say, was my opinion under oath. Without any 
question, I think that is so. In the country, I think, the more respectable class 
of dealers are destroyed, while in the city it seems to me to be the other way, 
and also, to a great extent, in the larger cities. 

Q. Would some law permitting the towns, if they saw fit, to grant the 
permission of sale under such restrictions as might be adopted, operate better, 
in your judgment, in regard to suppressing the evils growing out of the sale 
of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I have no opinion upon the subject of a license law, because it would 
depend so entirely upon the character of the law. I do not think any law 



APPENDIX. m 

would operate so badly as the present law. I often find very young men that 
I know in ray own town, mechanics and farmer's sons who are in the habit of 
using liquors, and from this and from what I know otherwise, I know that 
moderate drinking has increased, more especially within the last twelve or 
fifteen years. What it is among the Irish and the lower classes, I suppose is 
as well known to the Committee as to myself, some of them being lawyers and 
equally conversant with the world. 

Q. As to the social usages, how do they compare with those of fifteen or 
twenty years ago, among the most respectable portion of the people ? 

A. I think that the use of intoxicating liquor is dishonorable in Bristol 
and Plymouth Counties. I suppose, however, that a very large mass of the 
men who are deemed temperance men are not so from principle, and are not 
really total abstainers. I suppose that, as men of the world, we might say 
that sea captains are almost universally addicted to the use of liquors, yet I 
never heard of a drunkard among them. 

Q. Where do they get it ? 

A. Anywhere. And it seems to me that if a man has a right to drink 
liquor, it will follow that it will be sold. 

It was suggested by Mr. Miner, that Bishop Baker, of New Hampshire, was 
present, and that at another time it might not be convenient to take his 
testimony ; and, by general consent of counsel and Committee, Bishop Baker 
was called in behalf of the remonstrants. 

Testimony of Bishop Baker. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Your residence is Concord, N. H. ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How many years have you occupied your present office ? 

A. Fifteen years. 

Q. Will you state through what portions of the country you have been 
accustomed to travel ? 

A. Through the Northern States and part of the Southern, embracing 
California and Oregon. , 

Q. How many times have you visited Oregon ? 

A. Twice. 

Q. And also California ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you state briefly your own view of the doctrines of temperance 
and those held by your ministry ? 

A. Probably it is in substance in favor of the prohibitory law. 

Q. Entirely so ? 

A . So far as I know. 

Q. Is your discipline generally in favor of that principle ? 

A. It is. Gentlemen who sell except in cases of extreme necessity are 
brought to trial. 

Q. And this is true of the church, whether in New England or elsewhere ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are the opinions of your ministry quite uniform ? 



342 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is your view, from the aspects which you observe in travelling, 
as to the condition of the temperance cause generally ? 

A . That it is good. 

Q. Do you perceive whether it is worse in New England than in States 
where it is not attempted to prohibit the sale ? 

A. I could not answer that definitely. 

Q. So far as hotel accommodations are concerned, what is your opinion 
as to their being authorized to sell ? Are these grounds upon which you 
would prefer such an arrangement that the hotels might sell to travellers ? 

A. No, sir. I do not know that there are. 

Q. Have you felt otherwise ? 

A . No, sir. 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 343 

ELEVENTH DAY. 

Friday, March 8, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, and resumed the hearing of testimony in 
behalf of the petitioners. 

Testimony op Rev. Andrew P. Peabody, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are now a Professor in Harvard College ? 

A. Yes, sir; Professor of Christian Morals. 

Q. How long have you been in the Christian ministry ? 

A. Thirty-four years. I was formerly the pastor of a church in 
Portsmouth. 

Q. Have you ever had occasion to consider, and have you considered, the 
relation which prohibitory legislation, like that of our liquor law, bears to 
practical morality in the community, and if so, will you be kind enough to 
state your observations and conclusions ? 

A. I was at one time very strongly in favor of prohibitory legislation, but 
I believe that it has done little or no permanent good, and has produced a 
great deal of evil. It has led to a vast amount of fraud and perjury ; has 
probably led to the adulteration of liquors used, and has thus rendered them 
more deleterious in their consequences. As to the operation of the present 
legislation in Massachusetts, my observation has been confined to Cambridge 
alone, but I feel quite sure that in Cambridge no effect has been produced 
upon the sale of ardent spirits by that legislation. 

Q. Do you think that it has produced any, and if so, what effect, upon the 
consumption of spirituous liquors as a beverage ? 

A. It has produced no assignable effect. 

Q. (By Mr. Srooner.) How long have you been a Professor in Harvard 
College ? 

A. Between six and seven years. 

Q. Was there a prohibitory law in New Hampshire when you lived there ? 

A. There was a prohibitory law in operation during several years of my 
residence there. I know that the law did not, in the city in which I resided, 
reduce the sale or the consumption of ardent spirits in any degree whatever. 
I am very certain that no one was deterred from selling, nor any one from 
purchasing ardent spirits, by the existence of the law. 

Q. Was the law enforced at all in Portsmouth ? 

A. Several attempts were made to enforce it — very partial, very brief, and 
with no enduring influence. A few persons were occasionally fined, but 
returned immediately to their business, and I knew not a single case of a 
person being molested a second time for selling. I became convinced of the 
worthlessness of the law, and its operation entirely defeated my hopes and 
expectations in regard to it in the city in which I lived. 

Q. Was there much intemperance in Portsmouth ? 



344 APPENDIX. 

A. As much, probably, as in any place of the same size ; I think that it 
was neither better nor worse. 

Q. Have you any accurate idea of how many persons in Portsmouth sold 
liquor ? 

A. I attempted, at several different times, to make an estimate, and the 
number varied a very little from one hundred and fifty. 

Q. What were the laws in New Hampshire previous to the' prohibitory law ? 

A. I think that there was a license law, but one so executed as to afford 
no barrier whatever against the sale of liquor. Any one who applied, received 
a license, and the fee was hardly more than sufficient to pay for its 
registration. 

Q. Then the license law was entirely ineffectual ? 

A. Entirely so. 

Q. Do you know of any license law in any State that ever did succeed in 
restricting the traffic ? 

A. I have never observed the workings of a license law in any State but 
this and New Hampshire. 

Q. What would you do in this State, where it is claimed that both kinds 
•of law have failed, to effect their object ? 

A. That is a very difficult question to answer. I should be very solicitous 
that the law should be declarative of the public sense as to the use and abuse 
of intoxicating liquors. I think that the laws help to educate each successive 
generation of the community, and that, against which there is no legal reproach 
or legal stigma, is very apt to be regarded as entirely innocent and harmless. 
But I should expect very little from legislation. I believe that the moral 
action of men upon their fellow-men by example, by influence, by personal 
effort, and especially the influence of parents and teachers, in forming the 
habits of the young, are the chief reliances in the establishment of temperate 
habits in the community. I have very little faith in any other method. 

Q. What is your idea of the use of intoxicating drinks as a beverage ? 

A. I have no doubt, that, except for medicinal purposes, distilled spirits 
are useless, and worse than useless. I should be very glad to have them 
banished entirely from the community. I have the same opinion in regard to 
what is ordinarily called wine, and sold as wine in America. I think other- 
wise in regard to the light and pure wines of Europe ; and could they be 
introduced, and brought into use here, I should regard such introduction and 
use as eminently favorable to the temperance cause. They would supply a 
means of refreshment, and a drink that would be stimulating without being 
intoxicating. 

Q. Then you regard the use, as a beverage, of distilled spirits, and the 
use of the article ordinarily sold in this country as wine, as injurious ? 

A. I do. 

Q. And it is very desirable to get rid of them if we can ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. But that both species of law have failed thus far to effect that object ? 

A. I believe so. 

Q. Still you would have some law upon the subject ? 

A. I would. 



APPENDIX. 345 

Q. But you would have a law declaratory of the sense of the community ? 

A. I would. 

Q. Because law is an educator ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. So that between a license law, giving a legal sanction to the sale of 
liquor, on the ground that the public good requires it, and a prohibitory law, 
although it is not enforced, you would prefer the latter inasmuch as it tells the 
truth ? Is not that your position ? 

A. It would be my position if I admitted your statement to be a statement 
of the whole ground ; but I believe that all the prohibitory laws that have been 
enacted have, as I said in the early part of my examination, done a great deal 
of mischief by the opportunities and invitations they offer for perjury on a 
large and most harmful scale, and for that reason I feel afraid of such laws. 

Q. Would you be without any law ? 

A. No ; the legislation which I should most prefer, and which I should 
regard as equitable, would be that which should impose upon vendors of 
intoxicating liquor the entire cost of the pauperism and crime that could be 
traced to the use of such means. 

Q. Do you conceive such legislation practicable ? 

A. I believe it to be. 

Q. You say the " entire cost of the pauperism and crime ; " is there not 
. in addition a great charge upon the public wealth ? 

A. There certainly is ; and I care not how heavy the charge, or how 
heavy a bill is brought against the vendors of intoxicating liquors for the 
mischief they may do. 

Q. Do you conceive that practicable ? 

A. I believe it to be. 

Q. How many millions of dollars do you suppose would be required to pay 
all these charges ? 

A . It would be an immense sum. 

Q. Would it not be more than all the liquor-dealers are worth ? 

A. In that case, you might crush the business completely. 

Q. Do you believe that system is practicable ? 

A . I believe that it is. 

Q. Then you would have neither a prohibitory law nor a license law ? 

A. No, I would not. 

Testimony of Rev. John Jones. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where is your residence ? 

A. Bellingham. 

Q. What is your occupation ? 

A. Up to the present year my occupation has been that of a clergyman. 

Q. Of what denomination ? 

A. Methodist. My present business is farming, and attending to some 
official duties in my own town. 

Q. Where have j^ou resided ? 

A. My native place was in Maine. I resided there until I was thirteen 
years old. 

44 



346 APPENDIX. 

Q. Were you in Maine at the time of the passage of the Maine Law ? 

A. I was. 

Q. State, very briefly, how you felt in regard to that measure, and what 
you did ? 

A. I felt very friendly to the measure, as a matter of course, flattering 
myself that it might do a great work in the suppression of the evils of intem- 
perance and in the promotion of the cause of temperance. I have yielded 
those convictions with as great a degree of reluctance as I ever did any 
convictions upon any subject, in my life. 

Q. What is your present opinion ? 

A. I have been greatly disappointed. The law has failed to do what I 
hoped it might do. At the time of the passage of that law, I was actively 
engaged in the cause of temperance, and had* under my supervision five 
divisions of the Sons of Temperance, in Oxford County ; and I found in these 
divisions, as well as in the community at large, a disposition, to a considerable 
extent, to rebel against the law. I took the law, and carried it into the 
divisions, and tried to persuade them, as far as possible, to accept it as the law 
of the people, and especially as the friends of temperance, to give it a fair 
trial ; to take it into their hands as their instrument, and to use it prudently 
and wisely for the suppression of the liquor traffic. 

A. What has been your observation of the workings of the prohibitory law 
in Massachusetts ? 

A. So far as my observation extends, either because of the operation of 
the law or for some other reason, (and I confess that I do not know what else 
to attribute it to,) the traffic has retired from public view and gone behind 
the curtain, and into obscure places. My opinion is, that the older class of 
men — in that portion of the State with which I am best acquainted, and in 
the entire western part of the State — drink very little liquor, but I observe 
that our young men are in the habit of dodging into these dark saloons, 
where they contract habits of drinking and gaming ; and the first intimation 
we have of such evil habits being uj)on them, we see them under the influence 
of liquor. My practice is, when I see a young man of my acquaintance 
under the influence of liquor, to go right to him, and say to him, " I perceive 
that you have been drinking. Where did you get your liquor ? How docs 
this happen ? I expected something better of you." Well, he declines telling 
me where he got it, but he got it in some sly place ; and my conviction has 
been, and still is, that if we must have the evil we had better have it in open 
daylight when we can see its workings, and take hold of it and handle it 
understandingly. 

Q. What, during the last ten or fifteen years, has been the progress of 
temperance or of intemperance, in the section of the State in which you 
live, the western part of Massachusetts ? 

A. I think that I cannot speak truthfully, upon that subject, without say- 
ing that among the younger men intemperance has increased. 

Q. What can you say in regard to the quantity of liquor sold and drank ? 

A. I cannot speak as to that ; I have no means of knowing the quantities 
sold or drank. 



APPENDIX. 347 

Q. What is your observation of the operation of the State agency in 
your own town ? 

A. I know but little about the State agency. We have little to do with it 
at present in our town. I will relate a brief sketch of history in connection 
with the State agency. Previous to 1860, so far as I know, the municipal 
authorities had been accustomed, under the law, to appoint a liquor agent, a 
town agent, and obtain liquor of the State Agent, and place it in the hands of 
the town agent to be sold to the people according to the law. There were 
complaints that bad work was made of the agency, and it was unquestionably 
true ; I know it to be true. A great many complaints were made about bad 
liquor. I had no means of knowing, personally, about the quality of the liquor 
previous to that time. I am not in the habit of buying any liquor, and 
therefore not able to judge of its quality. In 1860, it fell to my lot to be 
Chairman of the Municipal Board, and knowing that the law required the 
appointment of an agent, I endeavored to find a suitable man that would 
answer the requirements of the law to take the agency. I endeavored to 
find a suitable man ; I could not find any such person in the town who 
would take the agency, and consequently in 1860 we had no agent, 
and I am not certain that we had in 1861 ; I think it is likely that 
we had not. In 1862, (if my memory serves me rightly,) the Board succeeded 
in hiring a very good man, (although his location was neither central nor 
convenient,) and ordered a quantity of liquor from the State Agent. He 
sold but very little, and found the agency so annoying that he absolutely 
declined to have the trouble of it another year. The agency and the liquor 
were consequently transferred to another man. After the liquors went into 
his hands, he brought the Board a specimen of the liquors that he had 
received from the former agent, and wished an examination of the quality. 

Q. Was an analysis made ? 

A. The liquors were thought to be so bad, that we ordered a specimen 
analyzed. The agent afterwards informed me that he carried a specimen of 
the liquor to, I think, Prof. Sheppard, of Amherst College, and had it ana- 
lized, and it was pronounced unfit for use. The agent inquired what should 
be done with the liquor, as he did not want to poison the people by selling it. 

Q. Within your sphere of observation, are the people inclined to go to the 
agent for liquor for medicinal purposes ? 

A. They are not willing to do it. The complaint is almost universal, 
that they cannot get liquors at the State agencies fit for use, either for 
sickness, or for other purposes. 

Q. How, then, do they supply themselves -with what is needed for med- 
icine ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. How extensive is that feeling ? 

A. So far as I hear any feeling or opinion expressed upon that subject, 
(and it is very frequently,) it is all in one way, — that the liquors kept by the 
agents are not suitable for use. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) When did you say this trouble with the agency 
was? 



348 APPENDIX. 

A. I think the liquors were procured in 1862. I formerly had the impres- 
sion that it was in 1861, and think that I so testified before the Committee 
last year ; but I now think that it was in 1862. 

Q. Are you sure that it was not in 1860 ? 
! A. I think that it was not in 1860, for we had no agent in 1860. I was 
Chairman of the Board that year, and know full well that I absolutely 
declined appointing an agent unless we could obtain a suitable man. 

Q. What is your business ? 

A. My principal business is farming. 

Q. Do you call yourself a Methodist minister ? 

A. I am in a sense ; but I am not supplying a pulpit this year. 

Q. In what sense are you a Methodist minister ? 

A. I am connected with that church as a minister, but for the present 
year am retired from pulpit service. 

Q. Why are you retired ? 

A. The condition of my lungs for years has been such that I have found 
it impossible to preach constantly, and have said to the authorities of the 
church that whenever there was a sufficient number of clergymen to supply 
the pulpits, that I should like to be released for a time from constant service. 

Q. Is that the only reason ? 

A . There is no other particular reason. I am still at the pleasure of the 
church, and can be called into regular work at their option. 

Q. Do you say that is the only particular reason ? 

A. There is no disaffection that I know of. I know of no reason, except 
that I requested to be released from regular work for the time being, and that 
request was granted. 

Q. Do you feel sure that if you had been willing to take an appointment 
like other Methodist ministers, that you would have had it ? 

A. I do not know anything to the contrary. 

Q. You say that you are opposed to this prohibitory law ? 

A. I am not particularly opposed to it. The great objection to the law, in 
my mind, is that the people decline to enforce it. I am in favor of any law 
that will suppress the evils of intemperance. Any enactment of the Legisla- 
ture, that the people will take into their own hands, and use effectually for 
the suppression of the evils of intemperance, I am in favor of. 

Q. What sort of a law do you think that would be ? 

A. I do not know. The general impression is that if there was a stringent 
license law it would be more satisfactory, but I do not know as it would be. 

Q. What " general impression " do you speak of? To what community or 
people do you refer ? 

A. The people, generally, in my own community. 

Q. Do the Methodists in your community want a license law ? 

A. The Methodists in my community want something that will apply 
effectually for the suppression of the evils of intemperance, and that want is 
not peculiar to the Methodists. I beg leave to say that, as a clergyman, I 
have always found myself upon the best side of the best society in New Eng- 
land, and have been very happy to be there ; and as a business man and min- 
ister and member of the Municipal Board, I have been brought in contact 



APPENDIX. 349 

•with another class of society, and have neeessarily become acquainted with 
such elements as I never could have become acquainted with merely as a 
clergyman, and I have had convictions forced upon my mind that probably 
never would have been forced upon my mind, had it not been for these cir- 
cumstances. 

Q. You say that the community in general want a different law. I want 
to know exactly how it is with the Methodist clergy and the Methodist 
denomination. Do they want a license law ? 

A. I am not aware that as such we do, or that any other church, as a 
church, want a license law. 

Q. I want to know if the majority of the Methodist clergy and the majority 
of the Methodist brethren, want a license law ? 

A. As to the Methodist ministers, I am not aware that the majority of 
them do. I am aware, that as such, they have no means of knowing what 
law will best accomplish the suppression of the evils of intemperance. They 
are not law-makers. They are in contact, as I have been, with the best side 
of the best society, and know but little about what is upon the opposite side. 

Q. Then you are better informed than Methodist ministers in general upon 
this subject ? 

A. In some respects, I am necessarily better informed. My business con- 
nections have placed me where I have been compelled to be better informed 
upon some subjects than the majority of Methodist clergymen. 

Q. Do the majority of Methodist clergymen go through the world with 
their eyes entirely closed ? 

A . I think that you had better ask them. 

Q. I want to know whether a majority of the Methodist clergymen, within 
your own knowledge, are opposed to this and in favor of a license law ? 

A. I cannot speak for them, but my opinion is that they are not. 

Q. Have you heard anything about their petitioning for or protesting 
against a license law ? 

A. I presume they have very generally protested against it. I know that 
one of my neighbors, and a very active and efficient man, told me that ho 
had signed a petition, and was in favor of a license law. 

Q. You made a statement that the community generally wanted a very 
stringent license law ? 

A. I did not say the majority. 

Q. You said the " community in general," did you not ? 

A. I am informed that out of 800 voters in the town of Amherst, which is 
my place of business, but 160 names could be obtained for a remonstrance. I 
do not know the number of petitioners in that town for a license law. I sup- 
pose that the petitions and remonstrances are in the hands of the Committee, 
and they can examine them for themselves. 

Q. Can you not remember the number of petitioners ? 

A . I have never seen the petition. 

Q. Have you not heard the number stated ? 

A. I do not know that I have. 

: Q, From what you have heard, how many do you think there are ? 

A. I cannot tell anything about it. 



350 APPENDIX. 

Testimony of Ex-Mayor Daniel Waldo Lincoln. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you live ? 

A. In Worcester. 

Q. What connection have you had with the government of the city of 
Worcester ? 

A. I have been at different times Alderman, and also Mayor of the city. 

Q. What do you think of the practicability of enforcing the prohibitory 
liquor law in the city of Worcester for the suppression of intemperance ? 

A. I have formed my opinion upon that subject, both from the experience 
of others and my own observation. I suppose there is no place in the Com- 
monwealth — certainly no large town — where the experiment of a prohibitory 
liquor law has been more thoroughly tested than in that city. Our elections, 
four times out of five, have hinged upon presumed views of the candidates 
upon this question. I do not know that anything more could have been done, 
than was done. We have had able and conscientious men in office. I do 
not know what measures could have been adopted for the enforcement of the 
law, better than those which have been tried. I suppose, however, that there 
has been no attempt or desire to stop the sale of liquors by first-class hotels 
and groceries ; but with that exception, I think that every means has been 
employed which I conceive could be used. Agents have been placed at the 
depots of the railroads of this city ; they have been placed month after month 
in all the depots at Worcester, and special police have been appointed, charged 
with the execution of this particular law, and prosecutions and seizures have 
been made, more extensive than those reported in the papers as having been 
made by the State Constabulary ; but my opinion is that it has not accom- 
plished the purpose ; that it has not substantially suppressed the sale of liquor 
nor diminished the cases of drunkenness. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.^) Do you think all the city officers entered into the 
business heartily ? 

A. I think they did. 

Q. Did the District- Attorney ? 

A . I think he did, as did also the Mayor, Aldermen, and Marshals. 

Q. (By Mr. Childs.) Will you be kind enough to inform the Commit- 
tee of the feeling and practice of the people in your city, in regard to going 
to the State agents to get liquor for medicinal purposes ? 

A. I presume it is done, but do not know to what extent. The amount of 
sales reported officially to the government is very small. 

Q. Are the people reluctant to go to the agents because they fear they 
cannot get good liquor, or that fit for medicinal purposes ? 

A. I cannot answer as to that matter. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) In what years were you Mayor of Worcester ? 

A. In 1863 and 1864. 

Q. Did you make a stringent effort to enforce the prohibitory law. 

A. I made an effort to enforce that law as I did all other laws. I suc- 
ceeded to an administration that made a very stringent effort, and in view of 
their failure, I did not follow entirely in their footsteps. 

Q. Does your memory run back to the time licenses were granted in 
Worcester ? 



APPENDIX. 351 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you recollect whether the license law was enforced ? 

A. In what respect ? 

Q. Were those who sold without a license prosecuted and driven out of 
the business ? 

A. I cannot tell ; I do not recollect. 

Q. Did the license party strictly keep their bonds ? 

A. I do not think they did, sir. 

Q. Did anybody try to make them, or prosecute them for not doing so ? 

A . I would not like to be understood in that way. I think the officers 
were careful to examine the character of men to whom they granted 
licenses, and in the manner which they discharged their duties, and to correct 
any abuse of the privilege. 

Q. But you do not think the unlicensed were driven out of the business ? 

A. I have no knowledge about that. 

Q. Do you know whether those who violated their bonds were ever 
prosecuted ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. Have you any doubt that they did not violate them constantly, in one 
way or another ? 

A. I have no doubt that they were not bound very tightly by them. 

Q. Have you any idea that the license law did anything to restrain the 
liquor traffic ? 

A. I think it did, sir. I think it restrained the traffic somewhat. 

Q. Was the traffic diminished in consequence of the license law ? 

A. I have no opinion about it. It was so long ago and my recollection not 
having been called to it lately, my opinion would not be worth anything. 

Q. What sort of law would you have ? 

A. I have no scheme of my own. I should be very reluctant to abolish 
this law until there was some substitute for it. I should like to see the experi- 
ment tried of a license law engrafted on to this law. 

Q. But you are not very clear about the law you would have engrafted on 
this? 

A. I think we really want two laws, one for the smaller towns and another 
for the larger towns and cities. I think we can enforce a law in the small 
villages that is impracticable in the large towns and cities. 

Q. Then you would not have the law equal everywhere ? 

A. There must be a general law of course. 

Q. Would you have a law authorizing the people of each town or city to 
sell it or not as they chose ? 

A. I would not. I would not let it enter into the elections at all. We 
have seen the effect of that in Worcester. I think if the licenses are given it 
should be by some committee or independent board, acting under a general 
system. 

Q. Suppose you had such a commission, would you allow them to license 
in Worcester and not in neighboring towns ? 

A. I would. 

Q. You say this law is adopted in the smaller towns. 



352 , APPENDIX. 

A. I do not know that it is particularly, bnt I think it can be substantially 
enforced in the smaller towns. 

Q. I asked you about the operation of the license law in Worcester. Did 
you ever know of a license law restraining the liquor traffic in the smaller 
towns ? 

A. I have never seen the operation of that law in any small town. I have 
never lived in a small town. 

Q. I did not know but that you might have heard enough to give an 
opinion. 

A. I think there is a class of people dealing in liquor whom it would be 
very hard to restrain by any law — the profits are so great. The reason why I 
would prefer a license law is, that those who seek to enforce it would have the 
co-operation of the men engaged in the traffic ; the licensed men are with you 
then. In an attempt to regulate and control the sale, I was always aided by 
the dealers. When I went to them and requested them to shut up their 
houses upon a Sunday or a holiday, I never failed in compelling it to be done. 
I do not think that during my two years' administration as Mayor, liquor 
was sold to any extent upon the Sabbath day. 

Q. Then you suppressed the sale under this law ? 

A. I controlled it ; it was a matter more of regulation than actual sup- 
pression or prohibition. 

Q. Then you would not have the town authorities grant licenses ? 

A. I would not ; that is my own view about it. 

Q. Supposing you had a commission, how would you grant licenses ? For 
instance, here is Boston surrounded by four or five cities, would you think it 
proper or the best thing to grant licenses in Boston and refuse to license in 
those cities ? 

A. No, sir; I think if you license at all, that there is need of licensing in 
large cities like Roxbury, Worcester and Cambridge. 

Q. Would you grant licenses in a town or city where the majority of the 
people did not want them ? 

A . It would be a matter for the exercise of sound discretion. 

Q. Do you think that it would be right for you, if you were the commis- 
sioner, or in the exercise of a sound discretion, do you think you would license 
a person to sell liquor in a town where a great majority of the people did not 
want it sold ? 

A. I would not. 

Q. How would it work, supposing Boston did not license, (and for a great 
many years we did not license at all,) and Charlestown should have several 
liquor-shops right over the bridge ? 

A. I think if the city of Boston can get along, we can everywhere else. 

Testimony of Rev. John Jones (continued.) 
Mr. Child. A question was asked you concerning your standing in the 
Methodist Church. 

Mr. Jones. I do .not know, gentlemen of the Committee, as the gentle- 
man (Mr. Spooner,) designed to cast any reflections on me ; I do not know 
that he did ; I simply desire to state a matter of fact in relation to my per- 



APPENDIX. 353 

sonal history. It is this : that my relation to the Methodist Church, as a clergy- 
man, shows a clean record. I want to tell the Committee where I have lived, 
and what I have been doing. My first year's ministry was in North Reading, 
Middlesex County, where I took up the subject of temperance, and lectured 
the people publicly, and was told that it was the first lecture upon the subject 
of temperance that had been delivered by anybody in North Reading for a 
series of years. That was, I think, fourteen years ago. The year following 
I had taken a location in the Maine Conference, but being worn out, I left it 
with the intention of going to Illinois ; but, by my friends residing in this 
State, I was induced to remain in Massachusetts, and renewed my relation 
with the New England Conference. As to my character, it has never been 
called in question in either the New England or Maine Conference. I went 
from Northampton to Leyden by appointment ; from Leyden to Pelham by 
appointment. Was regularly appointed in Pelham three consecutive years ; 
was then regularly appointed at South Amherst for five consecutive years ; 
then regularly appointed at North Amherst, residing where I now live, for 
three consecutive years, which terminated last April. At my own request, I 
was then put upon the superannuated list for the present year, without being 
responsible to supply any pulpit regularly. 

Testimony of Rev. George B. Ide, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside at the present time ? 

A. In Springfield, in this State. 

Q. What is your position or profession ? 

A. I am a clergyman, and pastor of the First Baptist Church. 

Q. How long have you been in Springfield ? 

A. I am now on my fifteenth year — fourteen years last October. 

Q. With your opportunities of observing the operations of the present 
prohibitory liquor law, what is your opinion of it as an instrumentality of 
checking intemperance ? 

A . The question is a somewhat difficult one for me to answer, as I was for 
fifteen years, previous to going to Springfield, pastor of the First Baptist 
Church of Philadelphia, and was not able to observe the progress of the tem- 
perance cause under your old license system, and therefore not competent to 
compare the two. For more than forty years, I have been a total abstinence 
man from all that can intoxicate. I took the pledge when a boy ; I have 
lived up to it and for nearly that whole period I have been a sincere promoter 
of the cause of temperance. In Philadelphia, under a license system, I had 
the opportunity of engaging in the temperance movement. 

Q. Speak of what you know of the operation of the license system 
elsewhere ? 

A. We had a license system in Philadelphia, — not a very stringent one, I 
believe, — but the result was that the entire Christian community, and nearly 
all good citizens were embarked in an earnest effort to promote temperance 
by individual, personal endeavor and moral suasion. We accomplished very 
great results. Nearly all our young men and a large part of the community, 
were enlisted in the movement.* About that time the Washingtonian move- 
ment commenced, and a lively interest upon the subject of temperance was 
45 



354 APPENDIX. 

everywhere manifested. I left Springfield and came to Philadelphia about 
that time. When I became acquainted with the position of the temperance 
cause in Springfield, I was very much surprised to find the entire front of the 
battle changed. Apparently the great point aimed at in Springfield was not 
personal, independent effort to save young men from intemperance, but to 
enforce the law. If there was a temperance meeting, the enforcement of the 
law was the main subject of consideration. I found it impracticable to get up 
any warm, living, active interest upon the subject of temperance among the 
members of my church, or in the community at large. The general feeling 
was that this great social evil had been placed in the catagory of penal 
offences by the law, and that the law must look out for itself; that the agents 
of the law must see to its administration. Time and time again I have gone 
into the movement with other clergymen, and endeavored to get up a feeling 
upon the subject of temperance ; sometimes the meetings were large ; oftener, 
however, they were very thinly attended. We have only been able at times 
to awaken a livelier interest in the execution of the law, but never to any 
earnest, systematic, broad effort to reach our young men and citizens at large, 
and make them personally interested, not only in their own reformation, but 
in the reformation of others. I was surprised to find that intemperance 
was actually more rife at Springfield among the class with which I came in 
contact than with any class with which I came in contact in Philadelphia. I 
am sure that intemperance has increased ever since, and within the last four 
or five years, very rapidly. It seems to me that every effort that could be 
made has been made to execute the law. We have elected men to the Police 
force upon the express condition that they would execute the law. We 
organized a large association of gentlemen, agreeing to guarantee protection 
to the officers of the law if they failed in bringing to conviction the parties 
arrested. Yet to my knowledge there has not been a single man convicted. 
When a man was arrested, he would give bonds and go on just as before. 
The State Constabulary have made what they call a thorough raid ; they 
have made large seizures, but the very men from whom they were made are, I 
think, going on as earnestly as ever. You can obtain liquor by the glass at 
the counters of those men just as you could before the seizure. Such is my 
observation of the state of facts now. I do not know how much worse it 
would be were there no prohibitory law ; it might be immeasurably worse. I 
speak of things as they are. I can only say that in Springfield the prohibitory 
law does not stop intemperance ; does not suppress the sale of liquor ; that 
under every effort to enforce it, intemperance and the sale of liquor is increas- 
ing. The tendency to intemperance among our young men, is much more 
prevalent than formerly. The middle-aged men, whose habits were formed 
under the old system of moral suasion, (when every man under a sense of 
responsibility went to his brother and tried to draw him to truth and right- 
eousness,) are more firm ; there is very little intemperance among them. It is 
among the young men who have grown up since that kind of effort ceased, 
that the tendency of intemperance is greatest. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Is the sale of liquor open in Springfield ? 

A. It is about as open as the doors are. 

Q. Are the bar-rooms open and bottles exposed on the counters ? 



APPENDIX. 355 

A. I cannot say, for I never go into such places. 
Q. How do you know so much about them then ? 
A. From general observation. 

Q. You say that liquor is free as ever ; you are very confident about that ? 
A. If you lived there you would be as confident as I am. 
Q. You spoke very confidently about it, but when I ask you, you do not 
seem to know. I want to know if the sale of liquor is just as open and public 
as it ever was, and if it is entirely open and public ? 

A . Perhaps not. Perhaps some means are taken to disguise the sale, but 
still it is sold publicly. You can go into any drinking saloon in the city and 
obtain liquor without any -sort of restriction. 

Q. Have none of them closed and given up the business ? 
A. It is possible that such cases have occurred. 
Q. Do you not know that there are ten or twenty that have closed ? 
A. I do not know that one has closed and given up the business. 
Q. Do you know that they -have not ? 

A. I do not know that they have, nor do I know that they have not. 
Q. "Were you in Boston twenty-five years ago ? 
A. I was thirty years ago. 

Q. What was the state of temperance here then ? 
A . I cannot state definitely, for I have no distinct recollection. 
Q. What was it in Philadelphia ? 

A. In Philadelphia, when I first went there, in 1838, there was a great 
deal of intemperance, but very earnest efforts were put forth, and a very great 
check was given to it for fifteen years, so that the state of society was very 
much improved ; still there was more or less intemperance. 
Qi They had a license law there ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long since you left there ? 

A. Fourteen and a half years. I am there very frequently now, but have 
no distinct knowledge in regard to the state of things in Philadelphia at 
present. 

Q. Was the license law enforced when you were there ? 
A. Not fully. 
Q. Was it to any extent ? 
A. Yes, sir, there was an attempt to enforce it. 
Q. What did they attempt to do under it ? 
A . They attempted to close all unlicensed grog-shops. 
Q. Did they succeed ? 
A. To a certain extent they did. 
Q. To what extent ? 

A. I cannot say. We temperance men cared very little about the law or 
about what the police did. We relied more upon our personal efforts and 
upon moral sausion. We fought our battle upon that base and paid very 
little attention to law in any form whatever. 
Q. What sort of a law would you have ? 

A . I do not say that I would have any, for I have very little opinion of 
legal defences of this character, because they must necessarily, from the very 



356 APPENDIX. 

constitution of human nature, be inefficient. I think the grand reliance 
should be upon the earnest efforts of good and Christian men to persuade 
everybody to temperance as we try to persuade everybody. The great battle 
must be fought upon that ground. 

Q. Would you dispense with all laws against crime, and trust-to that alone ? 

A. By no means. 

Q. How do you regard the morality of the traffic ? 

A. I regard it as a social crime. 

Q. Would you give the sanction of the law to a social crime ? 

A . No, sir ; I would not. 

Q. But you say that the sale of liquor is a social crime, and you ask for a 
license which shall give to that social crime the sanction of the law. Could 
you with such convictions give a license for the sale of liquor ? 

A. I think I would not. I suppose I would have the same objection to a 
license law that I would have to a prohibitory law. My objection to the pro- 
hibitory law is not that it is wrong in principle for the State to prohibit a 
practice which I regard as a social crime, but my doctrine is, that because of 
having this prohibitory law, good men have begun to feel that the law must 
execute itself. If we had no law, every man would feel that he would have 
to go to work to save the community, as we do to save sinners. We should have 
Christian men putting their hearts in the work, instead of trusting to the 
police as they now do. We must have true Christian effort to do good in the 
world. 

Q. If you had any law, then, you would have a law that told the truth ? 

A. I would. 

Testimony of Rev. Leonard Bacon, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In New Haven, Connecticut. 

Q. What has been your position and calling ? 

A. I have been pastor of the First Church in New Haven For forty-two 
years. 
. Q. What position do you occupy at the present time ? 

A. I am now the retired pastor of that church, and for the present year 
am performing the duties of Professor of Didactic Theology in the Theo- 
logical Deparment of Yale College. 

Q. Have you in the State of Connecticut a prohibitory law similar to 
ours ? 

A. We have in Connecticut what is called a prohibitory law. I have not, 
however, recently compared that law with the one which you have in Massa- 
chusetts, and am not competent to say how far the two are identical. I sup- 
pose them to be identical in principle and aim, but in not all the details. 

Q. Have you observed the effect in New Haven of your own law since its 
enactment ? 

A. For the first few months after that law went into operation, some of its 
obvious effects were very good. The law was to go into effect, I think, the 
first day of August, 1854. The men who had been engaged in the sale of 
intoxicating drinks, and the parties who were their customers, laid their plans 



APPENDIX. 357 

to defeat the intent of the law. For a week before the first of August, (if 
that was the date,) the town of New Haven was in great commotion. The 
men who dealt in liquor were closing up their business very ostentatiously. 
Temperate and intemperate men were laying in their stores for a state of 
siege, and carts, with demijohns and kegs, were in motion through all the 
streets. The people were pretty well supplied for a few weeks or months or 
years, according to their habits ; for some people have such habits that they 
could not be supplied in advance for a very long time. The administration 
of the law there, depends upon the action of the town. If I recollect rightly, 
it requires, to begin with, an appropriation from the town to furnish the liquor 
to the town agent ; and the first hitch in the law in New Haven was to get that 
appropriation made at the town meeting. I went to the town meeting several 
times, and stood out upon the green to be counted with the others to get that 
appropriation, and until that appropriation was got, the people of course must 
live on the stores that they had laid in. There was not a drop of liquor that 
anybody knew of to be sold in the whole city of New Haven. The policy of 
the opponents of the law — the dealers and their allies — was to reduce the city 
by that siege, and compel them to go without liquor for mechanical, chemical, 
manufacturing, medicinal and sacramental uses ; but at last we succeeded in 
getting the appropriation, and the selectmen appointed an agent according to 
the law, and a very good man he was — a deacon in one of our Congregational 
churches and a city missionary. How well qualified he was to carry on that 
business I do not know ; but I had a strong impression that when the deacon 
went to New York to lay in his store of liquor, there had been a notice* given 
there that there was a Connecticut deacon coming there to buy liquor, and 
they palmed off on him such liquor as would answer their purpose. I do not 
know how that may have been. During the winter that followed there was a 
very great diminution of crimes against the order of the city. Breaches of 
the peace, fighting, quarrelling, certainly decreased just for that winter. We 
all rejoiced. I had never petitioned for the law, believing it to be impracti- 
cable ; but, when it was passed, I went to a public meeting held for congratu- 
lation, and rejoiced with the rest, and gave my assurance that I would do 
what I could in aiding to maintain the law. I also gave testimony in regard 
to its workings that was published. A man came from Canada collecting 
opinions and statistics, and I gave my testimony as to the actual working of 
the law at that time. At the next town election, when the town passed from 
the control of one political party into the hands of another, the deacon was 
dismissed from the town agency, and a man with a very red nose appointed 
in his place. By him the agency was continued one year more, and at the 
next town meeting a vote was passed to close the " town grog-shop " as it was 
called, and it was closed ; and from that day to this there has not been a drop 
of any distilled spirits, or of anything under the name of wine, of lager beer 
or of ale, sold in the city of New Haven, but in violation and contempt of the 
law. There is not a church in New Haven that celebrates the Lord's Supper 
without hiring somebody to violate the law. There is where we are to-day 
under a prohibitory liquor law. I understand that a movement is in progress 
to have a State Constabulary. I do not understand what that is, but suppose 
that it is something that will put the law in force. I believe that the result of 



358 APPENDIX. 

that movement will be a political revolution in the State of Connecticut — a 
revolution not in respect to our local politics merely, but of national, and 
affecting not merely the welfare of the State, but the interest of the nation. 
The power will be put into the hands of an entirely different set of men. 

Q. What is your opinion of the practicability of promoting the temperance 
cause by prohibitory legislation ? 

A. So far as my observation iu the town of New Haven extends, there is 
more intemperance now than there ever was before. I think that since the 
introduction of this species of legislation, the interest of the best people, in 
the temperance reformation has greatly diminished. I think the progress of 
that reform, by means of voluntary and mutual pledges of total abstinence, 
has been entirely interrupted. A new issue has been raised. At the start 
of the temperance reform, the question was : " Will you agree with me, and 
with others, to abstain from the ordinary use of ardent spirits, in consideration 
of its mischief in the community; will you agree with me, that you will not 
drink it yourself, nor offer it to your workmen, nor to your servants, nor to 
your guests, nor have it in your family, as an ordinary drink ? " That was 
the issue then, but it is not the issue to-day. A " temperance man" to-day, 
in our language in Connecticut, does not mean a man who personally abstains, 
even though he is pledged to abstain, but it means one who upholds the pro- 
hibitory law, and I believe that I am myself hardly considered a temperance 
man because I am not understood to uphold the present law and keep it on 
the statute book. I therefore think that the cause of temperance, and 
especially among the young men, is not making progress. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the principle lying at the foundation of 
this system of making the sale of liquor a crime, and the drinking not ? 

A. My theory is, that getting drunk is not only a crime, but a sin, and 
that the drunkard is a criminal ; that the man who gives or sells him liquor 
is an accessory to his crime, and that therefore the accessory should be 
punished with the criminal, and not by a vicarious substitution, in the place 
of him. We have in Connecticut a law which punishes a man for getting 
drunk ; it came down to us from the olden time when we had (what are now 
called), the "blue laws," and that law is executed. In the police reports 
each morning we may see that some party was taken before the city court 
and fined for being drunk. 

Q. Do you consider it a sin, or a crime, under all circumstances, not to 
abstain ? 

A. I think there has never yet been a prohibitory law based upon that 
theory. There are circumstances where it is not only not a crime, but a duty 
to drink. It is the duty of a man whose health requires it, to take a glass of 
ale, or wine, or beer, or brandy. And it is the duty of those who would 
remember Christ according to the words of His institution, to drink of the 
cup that shows His blood. In those cases it certainly is not a crime, and 
certainly is not a sin. The ordinary use of it for conviviality, and for 
excitement, I hold to be wrong because of its general consequences. I 
do not at all believe in any chemical theory of temperance, — that anything 
upon which the natural process of fermentation has passed, is a poison, 
and being a poison, it is therefore wrong to use it. It seems to me 



APPENDIX. 359 

that legislation upon this subject should seek to repress, to the greatest 
reasonable extent, to the greatest practicable extent, the ordinary use of 
drink for purposes of excitement and conviviality. But I do not think that 
a wise legislator, framing a code of laws for any other than an imaginary 
republic, like that of Plato, would undertake to meddle, by way of legislation, 
with such details of domestic life, as to say what a man should put upon his 
table, or use in his family by way of diet. My impression is, that not only 
in the New England States, but in all the States, drunkenness has ever been 
held to be one of the offences against society, and that whatever can be done 
to effectually suppress it, should be done. There was one effect of our law 
which I have not mentioned. The shutting up of all taverns, and of every 
place of that kind, thereby making it impossible to purchase liquor in small 
quantities, or in any quantity without going to New York, at once led to the 
formation in our city, of clubs of young men, (and of men who were not so 
young), having their club-rooms, and with stores of liquor for convivial use, 
secreted in their club-rooms, and those clubs have been a prolific source of 
demoralization. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) If I understood you rightly, in speaking of the 
deacon who went to New York for liquor, you conveyed the idea that he was 
a professed temperance man, but attempted to supply himself liberally with 
liquor at New York ? 

A. Not at all ; the idea that I meant to convey was, that he did not 
understand good liquor, and therefore could not get a good supply. That 
was my impression at the time. 

Q. He was practically a temperance man ? 

A. He was, and an earnest working temperance man ; a man whose char- 
acter was above suspicion. I know that if I was appointed agent, I should 
certainly be imposed upon -by the liquor-dealers, and I had an impression that 
the deacon was sold in the same way, but I am not sure of it. 

Q. You would not, then, assume the position of State Agent ? 

A. I would not like to assume the responsibility of being taster and tryer 
for the State. 

Q. Yon say that the law has not had any effect in restraining or 
preventing intemperance ? 

A . I do not attend upon the Courts of Law or upon the Police Court, but 
I see the reports of cases tried, and I do not think that there has yet been a 
trial of a complaint, or a prosecution for selling liquor, in any of our courts 
at New Haven. Soon after the law went into effect, or rather into non- 
effect, there was an attempt made, if I remember rightly, to shut up, 
by the law, one or two very bad saloons. The keepers were prosecuted, 
and the consequence was that one of the most respectable apothecaries 
in the town was prosecuted for violating the law. Since then I believe that 
there have been no attempts. We have a state of law there, by which the 
lowest and worst keeper of a saloon can say, " I do not break the law any 
more than the man who keeps an apothecary shop." 

Q. Do I understand you to attribute the formation of drinking-clubs, to 
the existence of the prohibitory law ? 

A. That is my impression. 



360 APPENDIX. 

Q. In what way does the law operate to produce that effect ? 

A. The law permits, I think, the purchase of liquor in the original pack- 
ages. Wealthy people could go to New York and buy their champagne or 
brandy from the. importers, in the original packages, and bring it home. 
There is no traffic ; it goes into their cellars and is ready for use. The clubs 
would operate in the same way. 

Q. You say that the law is not enforced, and yet it has driven people to 
New York to buy in the original package ? 

A. I spoke of the first months when it was enforced. The law appeared 
to operate for a little while beautifully, but did not interfere with the forming 
of these clubs. 

Q. You are going to have a State Constabulary ? 

A. I do not know about that ; I understand that an attempt is being made 
to have them. 

Q. You say that you could not legally buy wine for sacramental purposes ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you ever know a time when you could buy such an article in this 
country, as the wine our Saviour drank and gave ? 

A. Yes, sir. I am pretty sure that the time has been, and now is, when, if 
there was no law against it, such wine could be bought, — wine manufactured 
in our own neighborhood. 

Q. Can you not get that without interfering with the law ? 

A . I think not, unless we manufacture it ourselves ; but the church does 
not want to run a vineyard and wine-press, although both institutions are 
scriptural. 

Q. Do you believe that you ever had wine from across the water; and used 
for sacramental purposes in New Haven, that was not enforced or adulterated ? 

A. I do not know; I have never had any analyzed; but I presume that 
the wines that are imported are in some way enforced or strengthened. 

Q. All of them ? 

A. I presume they are. I do not know whether or not they could be im- 
ported without it, although I have seen advertisements of wine imported ex- 
pressly for sacramental purposes that was not enforced. I do not know 
whether our church officers ever procured such wines or not. 

Q. Then you could not get the same article that our Saviour used, before 
the operation of the prohibitory law ? 

A. I never thought that the half teaspoonful of wine, consumed by each 
communicant at the celebration of the Lord's Supper, was a matter in which 
the homeospathic quantity of brandy or alcohol which might possibly be con- 
tained in it, was worthy to be searched out. 

Q. You say that you cannot now get the article that the Saviour used 
without violating the law, and probably could not before the law was passed ? 

A. Probably not. I remember hearing a deacon of my church say, at the 
beginning of the temperance reformation, that when he purchased wine for 
the sacrament, he followed this rule : he purchased good wine, because 
those who knew good wine, would not think of it when they tasted it, and 
those that did not, would not think of it. He tried to procure an article 
which would never raise a question in the mind of the communicant, as to 



APPENDIX. 361 

what it was. I suppose that is as near as we can approximate the design 
of the institution. 

Q. What law would you prefer to the present ? , 

A. A good many years ago, I declined signing petitions (which was one 
of the regular duties of a temperance man,) for new laws. They had in 
Connecticut, as long ago as I can remember, a law which was called a license 
law, and I made up my mind after several experiments with that law, that 
what was most needed to work a reformation, was not alteration and changes 
of the law, but a public opinion that would carry into full effect the law we 
already had, according to the theory upon which it was passed. The law we 
then had was one which permitted the civil authorities of each town to license 
such persons, as they thought to be trustworthy, as retailers, but the retailer 
was not allowed to sell anything for the purpose of being consumed upon the 
premises, but he might sell in small quantities to persons who wanted it to 
carry home. Certain persons were also licensed to keep tavern, but the law 
prohibited the tavern-keeper from selling to minors and students, and from 
permitting the people of the town from tippling at his house, and, in short, 
prohibited him from selling liquor at all, except to guests, to travellers, and to 
regular boarders. That was the theory of the law ; what was most needed 
was such a reformation in public sentiment as would carry it into stringent 
operation. It was in operation, and had advantages above the present sys- 
tem. I would prefer that to the present law, because that was a restraint ; 
this is not. 

Q. Was that law enforced ? 

A. To a very considerable extent it was. 

Q. To what extent ? How many men were licensed in New Haven ? 

A. I cannot say. Upon the first Monday in January of each year, the 
civil authorities of the town, namely, the selectmen and justices of the peace, 
had a meeting, and one of their duties was to designate such persons as should 
be intrusted with a license, and those persons who were licensed to sell in less 
quantities than five gallons, of course, had an interest in seeing that no person 
without a license should be permitted to sell. It created an interest in main- 
taining the law, in every vendor. The taverns, also, were watchful of the 
unlicensed dram-shops. I know that from time to time we had prosecutions 
against those who unlawfully sold > and raids made upon them, and I think 
with better effect than any prosecutions or raids under the present law. I do 
not say that that law was my ideal of a law. I think that the basis of any 
law upon this subject, should be a recognition of the crime and sin of drunk- 
enness ; and that the law should give protection to the family, to the wife and 
children of the drunkard, or to the parent of a boy or young man who is 
contracting intemperate habits. It should give every possible redress in the 
way of civil remedy to those who suffer from the traffic, and it should decree 
punishment for violations of the law by such penalties as can be exacted. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Have you knowledge of the operations of a 
prohibitory law, elsewhere than in New Haven ? 

A. I cannot say that I have any personal knowledge. I have inquired if 
the same state of things existed in Hartford, and am told that they still kept 
up the town agency there. 
46 



362 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you know whether the prohibitory law is being enforced in any part 
of Connecticut ? 

A. I have been told that in Windham County, where there are no cities, 
the law is enforced ; but I do not know. So I have been told repeatedly, 
that it is enforced here in Boston. You may take a hill-side town, where the 
population is not over five hundred, and the probability is that there is no 
liquor sold in that town ; and it is comparatively easy where there are no 
groceries, or anything else sold, to hinder the sale of ardent spirits ; and as 
the people must go to the next town to make all their purchases, it is no incon- 
venience for them to have the law enforced in their own town. In such places 
as that, I presume that the law is pretty well enforc*cd. 

Q. Is it enforced in any entire county ? 

A. I do not know. I will not speak from reports, as I have learned to 
distrust such reports. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) At what time were licenses first granted ? 

A. I think the granting of licenses has continued from time immemorial. 
A license law continued, I think, until 1854. After the temperance move- 
ment began, there was a great outcry made against the wickedness of licensing 
men to sell liquor ; and people's heads, I think, got a little muddled upon that 
subject, until at last an attempt was made to entirely suppress the sale by the 
prohibitory law, which in Connecticut, transfers the traffic from individuals to 
the State itself. 

Q. What was the population of New Haven, forty years ago ? 

A. I think it was about nine thousand, and twenty years ago, I think the 
population was not far from twenty thousand. 

Q. How many do you think were licensed then ? 

A. I cannot say, but I should think that forty years ago they might have 
licensed twenty or thirty men as retailers, not as tavern-keepers. 

Q. Tavern-keepers were licensed, in addition to that number ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Would you be surprised if twice that' number were licensed then ? 

A. I should be, decidedly. 

Q. Suppose that fifty were licensed in a town of nine thousand inhabitants ; 
what sort of restraint could be exercised by such a law ? 

A. There was nothing at that time to hinder an intemperate man from 
getting his bottle filled, and carrying it home, until the man was placed under 
the law and people forbidden to sell to him. There is nothing of that kind 
now in the law. A man was considered, under that law, competent to take 
care of himself. I believe that there is no law to hinder a man from walking 
on a railroad track, but the theory of the law is, that if a man has not got 
wit enough to keep out of the way of a train of cars, he had better be run over. 

Q. I want to know how it is possible to restrain the traffic under a license 
law ? 

A. I should say that under such a law as we had, what was most wanted 
was an aroused feeling or conviction upon the part of the aggregate commu- 
nity, that the sale of ardent spirits was more dangerous than it was supposed 
to be ; and that therefore the number of persons licensed to sell it by retail, 
should be diminished, and their responsibility to the law increased ; that the 



APPENDIX. 363 

number of taverns should be limited, and that lieenses for the sale of liquor 
should not be given to eating-houses. It was the grand weakness of that law, 
(as I suppose it is of the prohibitory law,) that the aggregate moral sense of 
the community did not sustain it. 

Q. Then you had exactly the same trouble with a license law that you 
have with a prohibitory law, — public sentiment did not sustain it. 

A. Just so fast as public opinion was aroused, our temperance reformers 
switched it off on a new track and tried to get a new law, instead of sustaining 
the old one. We had a succession of new laws, until now we have the 
ne jjIus ultra in the shape of the Maine Law. The liquor-dealers are satisfied 
with it, because it is just what they want, and the temperance people are 
bound to be satisfied with it, because they got it, and are pledged to stand 
by it. Under the old license law we had succeeded in getting the public 
roused to the idea that the ordinary use of liquor, for refreshment, for excite- 
ment, for purposes of hospitality or conviviality, was mischievous, and persons 
by thousands were pledging themselves to abandon it. The present law was 
enacted, a new issue was raised, and to-day the issue was not whether such a 
use of liquor is dangerous or detrimental, but whether the use of it shall be 
suppressed in this particular way. 

Q. You say that in New Haven a man who does not go for the prohibitory 
law, although he is practically a total abstainer from the use of liquor, is not 
now called a temperance man ? 

A. I rather think so, — that such a man is not considered to be quite 
sound. 

Q. Now, Doctor, you are a man of note and character ; do you really 
mean to say that in Connecticut a total abstinence man is not called a tem- 
perance man ? 

A. Day before yesterday I was invited to appear before this Committee. 
I had some hesitation about coining. I had already positively refused to 
come, but I received another invitation, in which it was stated that the honor- 
able gentlemen of the Committee requested that I would come, so I took 
advice. Some of the gentlemen with whom I advised thought that I would 
suffer damage in character, and perhaps the institution with which I am 
connected might suffer by my appearing here. In that connection, it was 
intimated that I had already suffered in that way ; that it was a common 
report that I was not a temperance man, because I had expressed my want 
of confidence in the efficacy of the prohibitory liquor law. 

Q. I want an answer to my question. Is not a man who is known to be a 
total abstinence man, although opposing the prohibitory law, called a temper- 
ance man in New Haven ? 

A. He calls himself a temperance man, and is called a temperance man 
by others, but I think that in a temperance convention he would be denounced 
as unsound, and not up to the mark on the subject of temperance. 

Q. You have three Ex-Governors in your State, — Ex-Governors Buck- 
ingham, Dutton and flawley ; I presume you are personally acquainted with 
them all ? 

A. We have two more, — Tom Seymour and Gov. Toucey. 

Q. They agree with you in sentiment, do they not ? 



364 APPENDIX. 

A. I think not, — neither of them. 

Q. They go for free rum ? 

A. For u free rum," — at least I remember that Gov. Seymour did in his 
inaugural message. 

Q. Do you know the gentlemen I have named ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. They are all respectable men ? 

A. Of the very highest character and standing. 

Q. They are all men of good sense ? 

A. Some of them have uncommon good sense. 

Q. Have not all ? 

A. They will all pass as having uncommon good sense. 

Q. Do you know the opinion of either of those gentlemen upon this law ? 

A. I do not know what the present opinion of Gov. Dutton is. I know 
that two years ago he attended a temperance convention at Saratoga Springs, 
and committed himself very strongly upon the subject ; but if he were here 
to-day I doubt whether he would give exactly the same testimony that he did 
then. 

Q. Why? 

A. Because, I think that he has considered the matter more fully since 
then, and is better aware of the impossibility of enforcing the law. If I 
remember rightly, he said at Saratoga, that it was practicable to enforce the 
law. 

Q. Do you know whether he is in favor of a State Constabulary in 
Connecticut ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. Do you know that cither one of those gentlemen are opposed to the 
prohibitory law ? 

A. I do not know it. 

Q. Do you know that they all have been at sometime ? 

A. Gov. Hawley, I think, was elected Lieutenant-Governor upon that 
issue. 

Q. You know that they have all been in favor of the law at one time, but 
you do not know that any of them have altered their opinion ? 

A. I do not know it. 

Q. But you think that as men of sense they ought to alter their opinions 
upon that law ? 

A. I think they should. 

Q. Is not that the great trouble with men of sense in this world, — they 
won't think as we do ? 

A. Sometimes they do ; all men of sense, however, are not of the same 
sense. 

Q. Have you ever travelled in foreign countries ? 

A. To some extent. 

Q. What have been your observations in regard t6 the use of wine in 
other countries, and its effect upon the people ? 

A. I cannot say that I am an expert upon that subject. 

Q. But you have observed V 



APPENDIX. 365 

A. I have observed a little in Mohammedan countries. 

Q. How was it there ? 

A. I was told by missionaries that the Mohammedans, under a prohibitory- 
liquor law, were dying out by drunkenness. I remember a Mohammedan 
merchant of Mosul, who would get through his business, and go home and 
reel into his harem drunk. That was perhaps the result of too much trade 
with the dealers in distilled liquor at the Levant. I recollect that the morn- 
ing after I arrived at Mosul, there came into the house a Dervish, a most 
religious looking fellow, in his way, who was drunk at the time, and appealed 
to our servants for some of the " red stuff" that he said the Franks were accus- 
tomed to drink. I merely travelled across France. I was in Paris but a very 
few days ; I was also in Rome a few days. I did not see any drunkenness there. 
I recollect one day, while walking about the streets of Paris, of seeing a man 
who was so intoxicated that he could not walk a straight line ; but I saw no 
man lying in the public places drunk. I ascribe it, however, not so much to 
the fact that wine is cheap, as I do to the fact that they have in Paris very 
strict police surveillance, and I suppose that travellers merely passing through 
the country cannot learn much about the habits of the people. 

Q. Do you think that the introduction of pure, simple wine would be a 
blessing to this country ? Have you formed an opinion ? 

A. I cannot say that I have. At the same time, I think that the intro- 
duction of distilled liquors has increased drunkenness, and all its evils, 
prodigiously, I think also, that persons who have formed habits of drunken- 
ness by the use of distilled liquors, can easily keep them up, and perhaps 
aggravate them by the superabundant use of fermented liquors. I cannot 
say what would be the effect of the introduction of cheap wines into a country, 
the people of which are so addicted to all kinds of excesses as are the people 
of the United States. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Was not the subject of prohibitory legislation 
brought up for consideration in the National Orthordox Congregational 
Council, held in this city, two or three years ago ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you remember the action of the Council upon it ? 

A. The subject of temperance, or of temperance reform was referred to a 
committee — a very respectable committee, but whose names I cannot recollect 
— and towards the close of the session they reported some resolutions, one of 
whicli contained an endorsement, so to speak, of the prohibitory liquor law. 
I had never appeared in public as a dissenter from that law, but I felt at the 
moment, that the Congregational ministers and churches of the United States 
ought not to be committed to so doubtful a policy, and I rose and 
expressed my feeling, and moved that that clause of the report be stricken 
out. Without much debate, with but a few words of protest, it was stricken 
out. It would have been passed, and passed unanimously probably, (for that 
is the way that such resolutions pass in such bodies,) if some one had not been 
rational enough to blurt out his opposition. My motion to strike out passed, 
and the resolution passed, as amended, and then, almost immediately after, 
there was a motion to reconsider, in order to restore the clause, but it was 
voted down, and after I left I understood that there was yet another motion, 



366 APPENDIX. 

which also failed. That action does not imply that a majority of that 
council were opposed to the policy of a prohibitory law, but it does imply that 
a man may be an Orthordox Congregational minister, in good standing in an 
Orthordox Congregational church, also in good standing, and not believe in 
the Maine Law ; that it is not a reason, stands vel cadentis ecclesice. 

Q. Allow me to ask, whether New Haven, taken as a community, 
entertains any such respect for this prohibitory law of Connecticut as to render 
it in any proper sense, a public testimony of the people ? 

A. I should think not. I should think that the law as it stands upon the 
statute book does not represent the general sense of the half million of people 
in Connecticut. I should think that it never did — not even when it was 
enacted. I think that it was passed by a collusion of political parties, to gain 
a little additional tenure of power — a little longer lease of life. I think that 
it was passed, with the expectation of a great many men who voted for it, 
that it would not long continue to be enforced. Furthermore, I think that 
provisions were put into that law for the express purpose of defeating it. 
For instance, lager-bier was made intoxicating, by statute. There was a very 
powerful Know Nothing element in the legislature that enacted that law, and 
such a clause arrayed the German population against the law. Something 
has been said here in regard to having the laws speak the truth. I think this 
law, standing upon our statute books to-day, is really a falsehood. I know of 
no worse law on the statute book than one which says that •such and such 
actions are criminal, and they shall be punished so and so, while those actions 
• are perpetrated continually in the face of day, and are not punished. 

Q. As a student and teacher of morals for many years, is it not your 
opinion, that such legislation, especially upon such a subject, tends to public 
demoralization ? 

A. My conviction is that this law does tend to popular demoralization. 
Such has been my conviction ever since the law went into operation, and I 
feel it more and more. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that such a law demoralizes the commu- 
nity ; do you not beUeve that the liquor traffic for the ordinary purposes, is an 
evil ? 

A. Yes, sir; I think that the traffic, for the ordinary purposes, and as 
ordinarily conducted, is an evil. And the problem of legislation is to reduce 
that evil to its minimum. 

Q. But when you license a man to do a thing, do you not say that it is 
right and proper for him to do it ? 

A. " Because of the hardness of your hearts, Moses wrote unto you this 
precept." It is legitimate and right for legislation to endure what it cannot 
suppress ; but to aim at the greatest practicable good is a duty. Moses did 
not venture, with Sinai behind him, to enact our law of divorce, but merely 
declared that if a man uses his personal liberty to send away his wife, he 
should give her, as the Irish servant says, a " char-ac-ter " to go with, and 
should not take her back after she had contracted another marriage. That 
was a great restraint upon the previous liberty of the Bedouins. I could 
refer you to chapter after chapter of legislation predicated upon that idea. 



APPENDIX. 367 

There are, at the present time, evils which cannot be* repressed, and must 
therefore be reduced to the narrowest possible limits. 

Q. Do you consider that Moses was right in saying that they might divorce 
themselves under certain circumstances ? 

A. He did not say they might, but he refused to say that they should not. 
He recognized the right without giving it. He only declared that if a man 
had a wife, and was displeased with her and sent her away, he should give her 
a writing ; but if he gave her a writing and sent her away, he should not take 
her back again after she had been married to another man. Moses limited 
the previously existing civil rights. 

Q. I am afraid, Doctor, that you are not sound in your theology. 

A . I am willing to be examined upon that, also. 

Q. As I read the Scripture, the Pharisees said that Moses said, " Give her 
a writing of divorcement," and that he said that because of the hardness of 
their hearts. 

A. The Pharisees did not say that; our Saviour said, "Because of the 
hardness of your hearts." 

Q. Did not our Saviour rebuke that practice ? 

A. Exactly ; our Saviour did not come as a legislator, but as a Revelator 
of absolute Truth. 

Q. Did He not say that it was wrong ? 

A. He did. 

Q. Did He not say that Moses was wrong ? 

A. I do not read my Bible so. 

Q. I will tell you how I read it 

The Chairman.. Let the witness state his opinion. 

Mr. Spooner. I want to state the fact. 

Dr. Bacon. If Mr. Spooner wants my opinion of his opinion, I will give 
it. 

Mr. Spooner. What I want to know is this : You stated what Moses said 
and did. You seem to think that because of the hardness of their hearts, 
Moses gave them authority to do what in itself was wrong. I want to ask if 
our Saviour did not rebuke that and say that Moses was wrong in saying what 
he did ? 

A . Our Saviour said that divorcing was wrong, but he never implied that the 
statute of Moses was not the best that could be made under the circumstances. 



Testimony of Ex-Mayor J. C. Blaisdell. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Fall, River. 

Q. What is your business ? 

A. Practising lawyer. 

Q. Have you been connected with the city government of Fall River ? 

A. I have, sir. In the years 1858 and '59, I was mayor of Fall River. 

Q. What is your opinion of the practical workings of the present prohib- 
itory law, and the practical enforcement of it, from what observation you have 
had? 



368 APPENDIX. 

A. Well, sir, there* are two or three prominent reasons why I have formed 
the opinion that I entertain with reference to it, the first of which is that the 
effort to enforce it is in its very nature a very demoralizing one, demoralizing 
upon all who have the enforcement of the law, or the effort to enforce it, 
intrusted to their keeping. In these cases, men whom we can rely upon in 
other affairs of life, men whom we regard as truthful men, when summoned in 
a case where the question is as to whether a man keeps a nuisance, or as to 
whether a man is a common seller, or a violator of the law in any form, being 
themselves the parties who may have received, in the very places charged 
with being nuisances, intoxicating liquors or other beverages, which they may 
or may not claim to have been intoxicating, they are unwilling to testify. 
They are utterly unwilling to say that they, at such a time, and under such 
circumstances, bought liquor of such a man in such a place, knowing what the 
effect of their testimony must be. Ordinarily, in the other avocations of life, 
where any other criminal transgresses, it is not so. In another respect it is 
demoralizing, in the extraordinary means that are being resorted to in order 
to enforce the law. And (what is most extraordinary) not willing that the 
law should be enforced as any other criminal law is, standing for its enforce- 
ment upon the common judgment and conscience of the people as to its rec- 
titude and right, the juries must be sifted, and we must have an extraordinary 
police force in the Commonwealth ; and they, with extraordinary powers, 
must have the right to go where ordinary policemen would not feel at liberty 
to go, and to make such examinations as ordinary policemen would not feel 
authorized to make ; and all under the pretence that they suspect that intox- 
icating liquors are sold in certain places. Mr. A., or Mr. B., who is known to 
be a radical man, is willing to subscribe for the purpose of issuing a search 
warrant. He does not know anything about it, but he is willing to put his 
hand to a search warrant, and say that he believes that intoxicating liquors 
are and have been sold in such a place. With such a warrant, the constable 
goes and makes a search of the place and finds nothing, not even a smell of 
liquor. I think it is demoralizing. It learns people to distrust the govern- 
ment under which they live, and to suspect the men with whom they come in 
contact, and to produce a feeling of unquiet and a feeling of distrust as to 
whether this is the right way to enforce a law of the Commonwealth that ought 
to rest upon the sound judgment and common sense of the community. So far 
as its practical enforcement is concerned in our own State, I have, for the last 
year, taken special pains to make inquiries with reference to it ; and I observed, 
too, as to what its practical workings were under the State Constabulary. In 
July last, we had a man sent to our community, an entire stranger, a mere 
itinerant, who at once attempted to take the places of both the court and the 
city government, and even went so far as to have our police indicted in Sep- 
tember. Suffice it to say that by his efforts it was said, publicly, that he had 
shut up all the places where liquor was openly sold, and that all the prominent 
places, where heretofore it could be obtained, were now, as he said, dried up. 
In a single street, I recollect that he made particular reference to the success 
of his efforts. In a part of the city called Canal Street, when he came there, 
there were said to be several places where liquor was sold, or could be had ; 
and in November, just before the cloud which he is now laboring under, he 



APPENDIX. 369 

said, in the city hall, that there was no place there where liquor could be had. 
Having heard of that statement, and having occasion to encounter him fre- 
quently, I took pains to ascertain the truth of that statement, and I found this 
to be the state of things in Canal Street, viz : In July, there were two places 
where liquor could be obtained, and in the month of November, there were 
seven places. And it was had in this way. Young men, boarding in that 
street, would get together in clubs of five or six in a house, and furnish them- 
selves with liquor, and go in and spend the evening in the back part of the 
house, and drink themselves drunk or until their supplies were exhausted. That 
is the fact. And yet this man says that there is no liquor to be had. The 
result of his work was that there were seven places where young men, instead 
of going in and getting a glass of beer, would go in and spend the entire even- 
ing, drinking themselves drunk, and going out, to be picked up, probably, on 
their way home by the police, and found in the police court next morning 
charged with being drunk. And as it regards the use, there was, in the year 
ending March 1, 1867, a larger number of arrests for drunkenness than there 
was for the year ending March 1, 1866, including in the year 1867 the time 
that the State Constabulary were at work. 

Q. Prior to that, they had not visited you ? 

A. They had not. I believe that Major Blood was the first man to make 
his appearance in our community. 

Q. Is drunkenness on the increase at present ? 

A. Yes, sir. I regret extremely to say it. It is done in this way': instead 
of being openly done (and the condition of things in Canal Street, is a fair 
illustration of pretty much all the streets), there are no open bars, unless you 
have the peculiar knock that will open the door, unless you have got the 
particular rap that is understood ; but they have these associations where they 
go in the darkness of the night, and where they sit until midnight, until they 
come out substantially manufactured drunkards. Now my opinion is that we 
can meet these evils in the daylight better than we can in the darkness of 
night. 

Q. What is your opinion with regard to some law which shall control and 
restrain the sale, instead of prohibiting it, as a beverage. 

A. Formerly I was very much in favor of the prohibitory law. I supposed 
that it was going to make clean work, and that it was going to produce 
precisely the results which it was said it would produce. But it is right the 
reverse. And I said several years ago that the law did not accomplish what 
it was anticipated that it would accomplish; and although I am a total 
abstinence man, yet, whenever this question comes up, I am called a 
"rummy." And so it is with every other man that dares to express his 
opinion. 

Q. What is the effect of this system of legislation in dividing the friends 
of temperance in co-operation by moral means ? 

A. Sad, sir, very ; for the manifest reason that when the friends of tem- 
perance come together for the purpose of putting in operation a series of 
moral means and moral forces, to the end that they may affect the hearts and 
consciences of men, and so secure their judgment, instead of doing that, the 
first thing is, — " Are you for the Maine Law ? " " Shall this law be enforced ? " 
47 



370 APPENDIX. 

That is the great idea. You must enforce the Maine Law. If that is 
called in question, why, it is said, " You are not with us." Consequently the 
tendency is, between parties, to divide and cause a lack of co-operation. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How long were you Mayor ? 

A. In 1858 and '59. 

Q. Did you attempt to get the traffic under ? 

A. I did, sir. 

Q. What success did you have ? 

A. I met with entire success so far as any known open places were con- 
cerned. But allow me to say that, when we had no open places in our city, 
the result was that people would go over the line, and fill their demijohns 
and bottles and jugs, and bring them down to the various places of resort, 
and there exhaust their supplies. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) What is the line you refer to ? 

A. The line between us and Rhode Island. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You did succeed, then, so far as open places 
were concerned ? Did you ever know of any such a state of things under 
the old license law ? 

A. I am not quite old enough, sir, to tell much about that. 

Q. Did you ever hear of a license law restraining the traffic at all any- 
where ? 

A. I do not know about that, sir. I have no knowledge about it at all. 
I am only speaking from my experience in reference to the prohibitory law, 
so far as I know. I think that almost any law is better than the present one. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) What would have been the result if they 
could not have gone to Rhode Island and got the liquor ? 

A. They would have got it somewhere else. 

Q. Suppose that they could not have got it in the other towns adjoining ? 

A. They would have taken more pains, but they would have got it some- 
where. 

Q. Substantially you think the law cannot do anything ? 

A. It has not done anything substantially as we see, but intemperance is 
is on the increase. 

Q. You convey the idea that the law cannot be carried out ? 

A. I would not say that it cannot, sir. I think that if the moral sense and 
the common conscience of the community was up to the enforcement of it, 
and would sustain the enforcement of it, then it might do some good. 

Q. What advantage do you conceive there might be under a license law ? 

A. I think that a license law, the common judgment and the moral sense 
of the community would sustain. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) In the country towns where no places are successful, 
would the amount of drinking be as much as if there were a license law ? 

A. I hardly think it would in the sparsely settled towns. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are near the line of the State of Rhode 
Island? 

A. Yes, sir ; further, however, than when I was Mayor. 

Q. What did you state in regard to the carrying out of the law ? 

A. I said that it was poor enough, but that it was far better than formerly. 



APPENDIX. 371 

Testimony of Hon. Louis Lapiiam. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Fall River. 

Q. What position do you occupy ? 

A. I have been justice of the police court for some fourteen years. 

A. What is your observation as to the effect of this prohibitory law, in 
checking drunkenness and intemperance, as far as you have formed an 
opinion ? 

A. When the law, in the first instance, was enacted, it was put in force in 
Fall River, and the number of seizures made was quite extensive, amounting 
to several thousand dollars' worth, and which was subsequently destroyed. 
After the law was put in operation in that mode, the effect was to break up 
some of the different establishments, and another effect was, that individuals 
associated together and purchased liquors and kept them where they could 
go and help themselves. There was a room of that kind which joined my 
office ; and in this association were a number of individuals known to me 
personally. And this continued for some weeks and some months. The result 
of the association thus formed was, that many of those individuals subsequently 
became intemperate. They may have been addicted to it to some extent 
before, but some of them were not. So far as I know, two or three of 
them died in consequence of their intemperance. There were some estab- 
lishments broken up, but it seemed not to lessen (with now and then excep- 
tions) the principal cause of drunkenness. In other words, the effect was to 
distribute, in small quantities, in different places, either alcoholic drinks or 
beer, or something that would produce intoxication by some means. Precisely 
what I know not, except that the result did not seem to suppress the use of 
liquor. At that time there was liquor to be obtained across the line in Rhode 
Island. Since ^hat it has been changed, to a considerable extent, because the 
line has been changed and carried south some two miles and a half. There 
was some interference with the carrying out of the law, until the question of 
constitutionality was decided in the case of Commonwealth v. Albi'o, the bill of 
exceptions in which I had the honor of drawing, and which stood until the 
case got into the higher courts. Occasionally there was a complaint made, 
and the case was set aside to await the action of other cases, in order that the 
parties might get at a thorough, full, and fair test. During the war, the law 
was practically a dead letter ; that is, either by common acquiescence, or other- 
wise, in the condition of things at that time, there seemed to be a harmony 
between rum and patriotism or rum and enlistment. They went on without 
interference either from our strongest temperance men or others. Since the 
war, there has been a commencement of seizures, which has been accompanied 
by more or less activity, and complaints for illegal selling. I may say, that 
during the war there were but few complaints for nuisances or for illegal sell- 
ing. There have been some efforts during the year by which some establish- 
ments have been broken up. There have been a number of complaints for 
illegal selling, and convictions have been obtained. No longer ago than yes- 
terday there were six cases in my own court. Nevertheless, intemperance 
does not seem to decrease. The fact, so far as I can ascertain from informa- 
tion and observation, seems to me that liquors are disseminated in small 



372 APPENDIX. 

quantities in different localities, and that people or individuals addicted to it, 
congregate in the night or day in a clandestine manner, and continue to use 
this beverage, and use it in such a manner that intemperance results. The 
number of convictions varies somewhat according to the season of the year, 
and in some seasons more than others, but on the whole the number of convic- 
tions for intemperance is as great in proportion to the population now as 
formerly. I am not able to state the exact details. There is another circum- 
stance in relation to this matter that has not escaped my observation, and it is 
this. It is an opinion of my own. I think that is a terrible evil, or whatever 
name it should be characterized by ; and either from these influences or some 
influences, it is extremely detrimental. The effect upon this class of individ- 
uals, who are brought up for intemperance, seems to be worse than it was when 
these liquor establishments were in operation. And I infer from what infor- 
mation I can get, and from the observation and appearance of the men who 
are brought before me, that it is a very deleterious article that is used. 
Whether any other system may or may not be better, I can only say that it 
has failed, after an earnest effort to enforce the seizure clause, and also that 
part of the law in relation to illegal sale, and that it has not been practically 
successful. Whether some other system would or would not be better, I 
cannot say until it is tried. 

Q. Have you any agency in Fall River ? 

A. There is an agency, sir. 

Q. Is there any inclination on the part of the people to go there for liquor,* 
or to get it at other places ? 

A. I have heard individuals say that in cases of sickness they did not dare 
to rely upon the liquor. There was one case brought to my attention partic- 
ularly not long since, where a gentleman stated to me that he went to the 
agency, and got some liquor, and that upon examination he found it to be 
defective. And I know of many individuals who have made such statements. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that the law has been enforced. That 
is, it has stopped the open sale, and has driven it into secret places ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. It seems not to have a wholesome effect ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now it is supposed that a man who is in the habit of drinking liquors 
will take any pains to get them ; but do you suppose that men frequent these 
places as much as they would, if the places were open, and no disgrace 
about it ? 

A. I think that men do frequent these places secretly. My reasons for 
this are that frequently one or more of them gets caught in a state of intoxica- 
tion, and is brought into the courts. 

Q. Do you think they go there as often as they would if nothing was said 
about enforcing the law ? Do they go and get their dram as often as they 
would if the sale was more open ? 

A. I think there is but little difference ; and I will state my reasons. No 
longer ago than last night, I was conversing with a young man, and he 
remarked, in allusion to this subject, " By — , I like to go and get liquor as I 
choose." I merely give his language and his sentiment as an illustration, not 



APPENDIX. 373 

expressing any opinion pro or con, except that this is a sentiment which I have 
noticed. As a simple matter of fact, there have been seizures, and some of 
these places have been broken up. This I know to be the fact, as I know 
of anything that occurs in the city, as a matter of observation. And I know 
from other facts : I am connected with the Washingtonian Association there ; 
and we are using what moral efforts we can in reference to this subject. Not 
longer ago than last Sabbath evening, I was told of a person who had been in 
the habit of drinking, who had attended our meetings, and had determined to 
abstain from the use. I am merely speaking, without having any theory to 
advance, one way or the other, as to the practical results so far as my observa- 
tion extends. I think that the practical result has been to disseminate the 
traffic, and distribute it among a greater number of places than there ever 
were before. 

Q. Does that lead you to the conclusion that liquor ought to be sold easily 
and freely ? 

A. My view of that matter is this. The attempt is to make liquor an out- 
law. I think it is impracticable in its results. The government is losing all 
control of an article which is used by the community, and used by individuals, 
which is intoxicating in its character, and detrimental and pernicious to the 
health of the community. If the government had, in some way, the control 
of this article, and the purity of the article, I think, as a matter of opinion, 
that the evils of the sale would be less. 

Q. Is not the effect of keeping poisonous liquors just the same as in any 
other case ? 

A. I think that the application of the law is the same. If the liquor could 
be annihilated or extirpated substantially, I would be glad of it. But the 
result, as far as my observation extends, has proved that it is impracticable in 
a community such as ours. Perhaps in the towns in the interior portions of 
the State, not having access by water to other places, the law might be more 
effective. But after an earnest effort to enforce the law on this subject, and 
after repeated prosecutions for the violation of it, at the same time the result, 
as I know from the records of the courts, has not been a diminution of intoxi- 
cation as a whole. 

Q. Who carries in the liquor cases in behalf of the government ? 

A. There is no counsel ordinarily ; occasionally some counsel is employed. 

Q. Do not the State Constables themselves carry on the prosecutions ? 

A. They make the complaints ; they do not carry on the cases. 

Q. Have they not asked you to allow them to do so, and you refused 
them ? 

A. I did. 

Q. Do they not carry on prosecutions in other places ? 

A. I only know that the statute provides that they shall not. If the 
objection is made, I can merely say that I have sustained the laws of the 
Commonwealth. 

Q. Is there an express statute of the Commonwealth ? 

A . There is. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) You said that you sentenced six persons 
yesterday ? 



374 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Had any of them been sentenced before for similar offences ? 

A. There was one or two or more of them who had been. The allega- 
tion was drawn np by the clerk without any particular examination as to their 
being second offences, and it was defective. 

Testimony of P. L. Page. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. I reside in the town of Pittsfield. I am an attorney and counsellor-at- 
law, and am now police justice in our county. I have been an advocate of 
the prohibitory law from the start, and have endeavored in my practice as an 
attorney during the last eight years, and as police justice, to carry it into 
effect. I must say, however, that my experience in these different capacities, 
and especially in the latter, as police justice, has compelled me to alter my 
opinion upon this law essentially. For some time after the law was enacted 
it was enforced in our place to a considerable extent ; and it was deemed dis- 
reputable about that time to sell liquor or to drink liquor, and a person lost 
character by being known to be a habitual drinker of intoxicating liquors. 
The law has been gradually, from year to year, according to my opinion, less 
and less enforced. There have been occasional waves of excitement upon the 
subject. Some new man would be in an official position and would expect to 
do what his predecessor had not done, and for a time there was perhaps less 
liquor sold ; for a few days or weeks ; I think I could not extend the time 
beyond weeks probably. But after that, the liquor shops it would seem were 
opened with redoubled energy, and sold more than ever; so that, from year 
to year, the sale and use of intoxicating drinks has increased very much 
according to the number of the population. Our population has nearly 
doubled from what it was ten years ago. And we have been somewhat 
unfortunate in our Deputy State Constable. A few months ago another State 
Constable was appointed in our town, a man of character, a man of respecta- 
bility, and of great energy and business talent ; and he had great confidence 
that he could revolutionize the matter for the better ; and all good people 
hoped that he would be able to do so. He commenced, and brought (I should 
think, if my memory serves me right) some half a dozen prosecutions, and he 
succeeded in getting one conviction for a single sale. Before, within about a 
year, the law had been substantially a dead letter in our town. And I must 
say that it is among the most unpleasant, and, I may say, sickening, part of 
my duties, to sit as magistrate in the trial of these liquor cases. Young men 
are summoned, eight or ten or twelve, ordinary respectable looking young 
men, summoned because it is believed, if not known, that they go into these 
places from day to day and from night to night, just as regularly as they do 
to their boarding places. And these young men will be asked, " Have you 
been into that shop ? " Perhaps they may say that they have. " Did you 
drink anything there ? " " No, I bought a cigar." Another is asked, " Did 
you drink anything ? " " Why, yes," he may say, " I drank something.'' 
" What did you drink ? " " Well, it tasted as much like sweetened water as 
anything." Another is asked, " Did you drink anything ? " " Why, yes, I 
drank some pop beer." Or perhaps he will say that it was cider, or some- 



APPENDIX. 375 

thing of that sort. " Was it intoxicating ? " " No, I guess not." And that 
is the character of the testimony, in perhaps nine cases out of ten that come 
up for trial. Of course it is not proper for me to charge anybody with per- 
jury, but speaking generally, it is my opinion that there are more cases of 
perjury, so far as my observation goes, from this one cause than from all other 
classes of cases combined. And when these young men thus testify, there are 
liquor-dealers, and liquor sympathizers, and they are cheered, as it were, in 
that course. The moral feeling of all the towns in the police courts in our 
place (I hope it is not so in other parts of the Commonwealth) is in favor of 
screening of the liquor-dealers from the action of the law. Very seldom is 
there a temperance man in the courts to give his influence. In reference to 
the efforts of our present State Constable, I have heard, since I came to this 
city, that he had resigned his position. Whether it is true or not, I am unable 
to say. It was only yesterday that the deputy-sheriff pointed out to me a 
place that was very brilliantly illuminated, and he says to me, " There is a 
liquor saloon just opened, and fitted up beautifully, at an expense of a thou- 
sand dollars, where they sell openly." And pointing to another place, he 
said, " There is a liquor den where there was an Irish funeral party stopped 
to get liquor, and they could not all get in there, and they actually passed the 
liquor out in water-pails." 

Q. I would inquire if you have a liquor agency in your town? 

A. We have, I undex-stand ; I had not heard of it at all until a few days 
ago, and I think there are only comparatively few who know where it is. It 
was a matter of some notoriety in the early history of this liquor law, when 
the town pump, as it was called, was patronized a good deal ; and there was 
a good deal said about the liquor that was vended there ; and men would go 
to other places where they could get better liquor. Of late years the State 
agency in our place is a dead letter ; perhaps not one in ten knew where the 
agency is, or who the agent was. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) There has been an agency there always, has 
there not ? 

A. I suppose there has been, though I have not known who the agent was. 

Q. Why did you say that they could not get the liquor ? Do you suppose 
that the liquor-dealers have an interest to get up this idea V 

A. I did not say that. I spoke of the opinions of other persons, who, I 
suppose, knew what good liquors were. 

Q. You say that intemperance now is greater in proportion to the popula- 
tion ? 

A. I said that the population had increased, and I intended to say that 
intemperance had increased faster than the population. 

Q. What is the character of the people of your place ? Is it not notorious 
that many of the leading men in Pittsfield are men of doubtful habits in that 
respect ? 

A. I cannot say that they are more doubtful than they are in other places 
of the same size. 

Q. What remedy do you propose for this state of things ? 

A. Well, sir, that is beyond my wisdom. I should refer that to the wisdom 
of the Legislature. I am not wise enough, and have not thought enough about 



376 APPENDIX. 

it to satisfy lny own mind as to what it is best to do now. The very general 
feeling among our people, I think, is one of dissatisfaction with the present 
state of things ; and, without being wedded to any beautiful theory, they 
want something to do to stop this increase in the traffic. 

Testimony of Chase Piiilbrick. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Lawrence. 

Q. What position do you hold there ? 

A. City Marshal. 

Q. How long have you held that position ? 

A. Three years next August. 

Q. What is the state of things in Lawrence in regard to the sale of 
liquors ? 

A. There is no open sale that I know of, and has not been for nearly a 
year and a half. 

Q. What is the state of intemperance ? 

A. It has been constantly increasing for the last three years. The occa- 
sional instances are very frequent. In 1864 we had before the Police Court, 
for drunkenness, three hundred and ninety-seven cases ; in 1865 there were 
five hundred and seventeen cases ; and in 1866 we had six hundred and 
eighty-one. 

Q. Where is this liquor got ? Where does it come from ? Where is it ? 

A. There are a great many places in Lawrence where it is kept privately. 
Bars are kept in behind kitchens and cellars, and kept under lock and key. 
In June, 1865, when the State Constabulary first came there, I gave them a 
list of all the places that were known to the officers, the names and the num- 
bers of the street. It amounted, I think, to one hundred and thirty-eight 
places where distilled or malt liquors, one or the other, were sold or dispensed. 
Two weeks ago last Monday, I think, I gave the officers instructions to give 
me another list of names of places where they supposed liquor was sold, and 
they gave the names of the places to me. The number amounted to one 
hundred and sixty-eight of these groggeries. 

Q. What has been done by the State Constabulary ? Anything ? 

A. There have been a great many prosecuted there — from forty to sixty I 
should say — at each term of court since June, 1865. 

Q. (By Mr. Spoonek.) You say there is no open sale ? 

A . Not any that I am aware of. 

Q. Do you not attribute this to a great extent to the influence of the war ? 

A. No, sir; I do not think the soldiers were such a drunken set as that, 
from my experience with them. 

Q. What do you attribute it to ? 

A. I attribute it partly to the kind of liquor they have been using, and the 
manner in which they have bought it. Instead of going to a saloon or a bar 
and buying a glass of liquor, or a glass of beer, and going home, they would 
get into one of these groggeries, and buy a pint, perhaps, and take it in their 
pocket to some place, and some two or three would get drunk on that before 
they got home. 



APPENDIX. 377 

Q. Then you hold that it is better to have an article sold free than it is to 
repress the sale to such a degree as you can repress it ? 

A. It is my opinion that there would not be so much drunkenness as there 
is now. 

Q. Would you repress it entirely ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How is it as to the liquor being brought in there 
by express ? 

A. I see a great many packages brought in by express, kegs and demi- 
johns, etc. 

Q. Do you know the extent of this ? 

A. I have no means of knowing the extent. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) If we had a license law would you favor an open 
bar? 

A. Well, I can hardly say as to that. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) The law, you think, seems to be a poor one, and 
it drives the sale out of sight ? 

A. Yes, sir; but we get it in the police court. 

Testimony of Ex-Mayor William S. Messervey. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Salem. 

Q. What position have you held there ? 

A. I have been mayor of the city. 

Q. When? 

A. In 1856 and 1857. 

Q. I would like to inquire as to any observation that you may have had 
as to the attempts to suppress intemperance ? 

A. As that was some time ago, I will read, with the permission of the 
Committee, my report, or rather my observation, coming under my own ex- 
perience, in a document which I delivered to the City Council of Salem. It 
covers what I know practically and experimentally on the subject. This was 
January 26, 1857, after I had been mayor a year : — 

" The whole number of arrests by the police, during the year ending Dec. 
31st, was 1,040. Whole number of prosecutions, 998; of this number 604 
were for drunkenness. Thus it will be seen that this vice, the prolific cause 
of nearly all other vices, and the never-failing source of the larger portion of 
that misery which is so apparent to those whose benevolence or duty prompt 
them to visit the abodes of the destitute and suffering, if not increasing, is 
certainly not diminishing. Of the whole number prosecuted for drunkenness, 
only five disclosed the names of the persons from whom they purchased their 
liquor. Eighteen prosecutions were had for violation of the liquor law ; thir- 
teen were convicted, and five acquitted. I desire to call your attention to the 
following statement in the Marshal's report : — 

" ' It will be seen that now, as heretofore, drunkenness constitutes a large 
portion of the crime to which the attention of the police is called ; and this 
will continue to be the case as long as the facilities for obtaining strong 
drink are so great, and the repugnance to becoming a witness in liquor prose- 
cutions so strong. It will also be seen that but few arrests have been made 
not followed by prosecutions ; this is owing to the fact, that in all arrests for 

48 



378 APPENDIX. 

drunkenness, no discretion is left with the arresting officer, the law making it 
his imperative duty to prosecute all such offenders.' 

" In view of this condition of things, it becomes us to inquire, is it the fault 
of the law, or of those whose duty it is to enforce it ? Drinking-houses and 
tippling-shops are more numerous now than ever before in this city, and the 
victims of intemperance force themselves upon the notice of the officers of 
the law. I speak of that which I know, when I affirm that the Chief Mar- 
shal has been untiring in his efforts to cause prosecutions for the violations of 
the liquor law, and at every step he has been met with the insuperable diffi- 
culty of obtaining the legal evidence for convictions. Every instrument has 
been employed, except illegal force, and stipendiary spies and informers ; indi- 
vidual liability barred the first, and the dignity and efficiency of the Depart- 
ment, and the moral sense of the community, forbade the employment of the 
latter. Those who complain that the law is not enforced, do not understand 
its provisions, or are ignorant of its operations. The law in its effect holds 
out a bounty to those who violate it in the enhanced profits of the traffic, 
and induces perjury in the victim when forced to appear as a witness for the 
prosecution, and whilst it does not lessen the number of those who sell, it in- 
creases the number of those who purchase. Constituted as society is, the law 
in its practical operation is a melancholy mockery, and a solemn farce. Those 
who think otherwise, should sacrifice considerations of personal safety, and 
brave public opinion, and make attempts to furnish the necessary evidence, and 
thus strengthen the power of the officers of the law, whose duty it is, and 
whose pleasure it will be, to endeavor to cause the conviction and punishment 
of the offender." 

Q. Do you continue to hold these opinions ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I have seen nothing to change my views. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What is the remedy, in your opinion ? 

A. Well, sir, it is merely a matter of opinion. I have thought some upon 
it, and have seen considerable of life, and have studied somewhat human 
nature. If I were a legislator I should look at this evil as an evil which 
exists. I should look at the fact. And then my theory of government, if 
there is any legislation in the case, is this : that when an evil cannot be sup- 
pressed, it should be controlled ; and I know of no way of controlling an evil 
like this except by a judicious license law. I think that the difficulty of the 
prohibitory law has been this : that it has undertaken to declare and punish 
as a crime, that which the moral sense of the community at large does not 
consider as a crime. I consider, also, that we have commenced at the wrong 
end, entirely. If it is a crime to sell liquor, it is certainly a crime to buy it. 
The sale cannot possibly be made without two parties being implicated in it. 
Now, I have seen it stated that there are two hundred places in the city of 
Boston, and I take it that there are as many as twenty persons who get their 
supplies from each and every one of these places. I think that the penalty 
should be inflicted on the persons who buy the liquor, if it is to be inflicted 
on those who sell. And as there is such a large portion of the community 
who do buy, my opinion is that the evil cannot be suppressed, in cities certainly. 
And if it cannot be suppressed, I should think that the legislature ought by 
come proper means to regulate and control it. 

Q. You lay down the broad principle, then, than an evil which cannot be 
suppressed ought to be controlled and regulated, — a broad principle, covering 
all kinds of evils and crimes ? 



APPENDIX. 379. 

A. If it cannot be suppressed, I will lay that down as a principle. 
Q. Many evils do exist to a great degree, and are very great evils. 
A. I do not think that a great evil can be suppressed entirely ; but if it 
gets to be as large as this evil, I think it ought to be controlled. 

Testimony of Henry A. Marsh. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You live in Amherst ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. How long have you lived in that neighborhood ? 

A. Since 1859. 

Q. Are you familiar with the moral condition of that region of which 
Amherst may be called the centre ? 

A. I think I am ; my business has brought me in contact with the people 
of that region a great deal. 

Q. What is your business ? 

A . Publisher and editor of a newspaper. 

Q. In respect to abstinence from intoxicating liquor and freedom from 
drunkenness, how does the present state of your community compare with 
what it was a dozen years ago ? 

A. As I did not live in that community a dozen years ago I could not 
compare it. 

Q. Then state positively without undertaking to state it relatively. 

A . As a general thing I think the community are temperate men ; not 
total abstainers. It is generally considered that the prohibitory law is enforced 
in that place. Notwithstanding, liquor can be obtained by any parties who 
want it, who have the money to buy it. The town has appointed town agents 
for three or four successive years, and the town has annually instructed to 
prosecute all infringements on the prohibitory law. I think that the select- 
men have honestly attempted to enforce it. They have instituted prosecu- 
tions wherever they could obtain evidence ; but it has been almost impossible 
to get persons to swear that they have had liquor at any place. They have 
no hesitation in saying that they think that liquor is used, but the persons who 
obtain the liquor will not disclose where it is obtained. There are a great 
many places where liquor is sold in private houses. Liquor is obtained by 
express. It comes there in packages from the city. I believe there is no 
difficulty in getting it from the city.. I believe there is no difficulty in persons 
ordering liquors through the express. 

Q. Did you state how many places there were in Amherst where liquor 
could be bought ? 

A . There are in that place some five or six saloons where beer and cider 
are sold, but I think no intoxicating liquors. I do not think travellers would 
find any difficulty in obtaining liquors at the hotels, though the citizens do 
not get it there. They purchase it at the town agency. All that a person 
has to do is to say that he wants it for sickness, and I believe that the agent 
has no power to deny him. It has been told me by persons who know, that 
there are some thirty places where liquor is sold in Irish families and other 
families ; and there are instances where people form clubs, and have generally 
a deposit, and go there and get their liquor as they like, but these are not 



380 APPENDIX. 

private houses. There have been some arrests, but it has been very difficult 
to convict. I do not know of but one conviction that has been obtained there 
in some time, and that was by means of a person who had disclosed where he 
had purchased liquor. 

Q. You have alluded to the fact that persons buy at the town agency. 
Have you looked into that to see how the sale of rum and whiskey stands 
relatively in the quantity of sale and the probable use of those articles for 
medicinal purposes ? 

A. Yes, sir, I have. Knowing how extensively it was sold at the town 
agency, I had the curiosity to examine the records and returns made to the 
State agent from that place and other places, and I found the amount was so 
much that I went carefully through it and made an abstract. I have here an 
abstract from some towns in every county in the State. 

Q. Is the law enforced in all these towns ? 

A. In most of the towns it is enforced. In the towns where the sale is 
open and public there are very small returns, and, in some cases, none at all. 
In some instances, in this abstract, it will be found that the average amounts 
to three and one-half gallons to every family in the town. This liquor consists 
of Medford rum, whiskey, Holland gin, &c. 

Testimony of Minot Tirell, Jr. 
Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are a practising lawyer in the town of 

Lynn ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you any knowledge of the present consumption of intoxicating 
liquors in Lynn, from your observation either as a citizen or in connection 
with your practice at the bar ? 

A. From my observation as a citizen, I should say there appeared to be 
no decrease in intoxication, liquor being within the reach, so far as I judge, of 
those who desire it, not by reason of any open places being kept — for, so far 
as my observation extends, there are no open places — but instead of that there 
have been several clubs formed in the neighborhood of my office. I took the 
trouble of inquiring this morning of parties whom I know, and I was informed 
that there were as many as six clubs existing within a radius of twenty rods 
of what is termed the Central Square, which is near the centre of the town 
and the principal business portion of the town. The existence of these clubs 
are such that the members of the clubs have an opportunity to go there and 
take different liquors in whatever quantity they may desire ; and, as I suppose, 
they purchase liquors, it is merely a purchase of liquors on their part, with a 
division among themselves. I have known of a case, within, I think, some 
two years, where parties were prosecuted for furnishing liquor to their cus- 
tomers. They had an extensive patronage among the business portion of the 
community, and their patrons or customers were anxious to obtain their 
liquors, and there was an arrangement made to supply them. I would say 
here, that our business is such that we bring the trade to our doors. Southern 
merchants coming here visit Lynn, and it is customary among those who have 
travelled great distances to take liquor, where otherwise they would not when 
at home ; and it was frequently the case that they could not purchase a glass 



APPENDIX. 381 

of liquor conveniently, and there was some attempt made in the way of 
making provision for those persons who came to our city as customers. So far 
as the sale of liquor is concerned, I do not think that there are at the present 
time any places of open sale ; but, so far as obtaining liquor is concerned, it 
appears that it is within the reach of every one who desires it. 

Q. Do you observe anything in the increased sobriety of the people which 
would indicate any lack of opportunity ? 

A. I do not. I might volunteer to say that there was more than at the 
time I spoke of. I regarded the case at that time to be that there was an 
apparent disposition on the part of the authorities to allow the sale. 

Q. At the present time it is stopped so far as the open sale is concerned ? 

A. Yes, sir ; so far as I have heard or seen. 

Q. And yet there is no increase of sobriety ? 

A. To all appearances there is none. There appears to be a complaint 
of drunkenness, more or less, caused by the drunkenness which we see in the 
streets. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Is it not the custom of some of the shoe dealers 
to furnish liquor to those of their customers who desire it ? 

A. I could not say, sir ; not having been in the business myself. 

Testimony of David Hoyt. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are a citizen of Deerfield ? 

A. That is my native place. I have been oif and on for the last twenty 
years. 

Q. Will you state, in your own way, what advantages or disadvantages 
your observation and experience have suggested to you as flowing from the 
prohibitory legislation of the State ? 

A. I have been a pretty considerable observer of the morals of our people. 
We claim to be a good moral people there, but we have exceptions, as all other 
places, I suppose, have ; but I have come to the conclusion that the present 
law is decidedfy a failure. Those that have drank heretofore to excess, con- 
tinue to do so hitherto and do at this time. I came accidentally across one of 
them, a man whom I would not let have a glass of liquor ; a man whom I 
have known for years, and I said to him : " What are you going to do when 
they put this law in force ? " — knowing that he would 1iave it if it was to be 
be had. " Our constables are here," said I, " and have seized everything in 
the county." " I do not care anything about it," was his reply. " Why, you 
cannot live without it?" said I. " I do not live without it," he said, " I have 
all I want." " Well," said I, " where can it be procured ? ". " Well," said he, 
" we have got a very liberal town agent; I get all I want there." "Well," 
said I, "is it a good article?" "We cannot do any better at present," he 
said. In addition to that, so far as my knowledge extends, we have a class of 
people there who manage to got it some way. We are not an intemperate 
people, I am happy to say, and we are an industrious and moral people as a 
general thing. But, like all other places, we have some that are bad ; and 
there is no law, either Maine law or any other law up to date, that will touch 
them at all, for some way or other, I do not know how they do it — there 
appears to be a combination — they seem to have (I do not know but I shall 



382 APPENDIX. 

hit some one,) a sort of freemasonry by which they all understand each other, 
and stand by each other, and supply themselves with what they want ; and 
what has been done by your State Constables has only put it a little out of 
reach. The places where they get it I know not ; but I have known of one 
package coming from New York. I do not know where it is got. This class 
of people do not seem to care whether we have an agent or not, and those 
who do not use it have very little feeling in the matter. We are an agricul- 
tural people, and if there is any class of people who, through the heat of sum- 
mer and the cold of winter, are most likely to need something in the way of 
stimulating drink, it is this class of people. But I am happy to say, that we 
have but few in our community who do use it ; and so far as it is used, and so 
far as intemperance exists among our people, this law does not reach it ; far 
from it. For myself, I am for a stringent license law, a judicious law. I am 
in favor of putting such duty as you please, upon a man who sells it, and 
that he shall be put under strict regulation and control in the sales, so that he 
may take care of those who are in the habit of using liquor to any extent- 
I never have had any confidence in this law. It does not touch us at all. "We 
have two faithful, and I do not know but honest, temperate State Constables ? 
and we occasionally see an account in the Greenfield paper of their great 
doings. We hear that they have been to Easthampton and got shot at, but 
that the constable took out his pistol and scared away whoever had shot at 
him. 

Q. Do you regard the present system of law as any substantial protection 
to the temperate people ? 

A. No, sir ; not in the least. For the men that we have who are intern, 
perate have all they want, and do not care anything about the present law. 
They are not dependant on the means of getting it in our town. Vermont is 
but a short distance from us and Connecticut is close by, and Springfield is 
close by, where the thing can be obtained. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that the people who are addicted to 
drinking in your region do not have any difficulty in obtaining liquor 
although they have got a good agent ? 

A. That was only one individual case that I spoke of. 

Q. But how is the license law going to help the matter in any other ? 

A. Well, sir ; so far as that is concerned, we have a hotel in our place, 
but the man who keeps it has not got a very great amount of custom. It is 
with difficulty that the man can live. I would license that landlord, and I 
would put such a duty upon him that he should break up all others in the 
business and I think he would be as good a police as you could get. 

Q. You would license him and it would be a respectable place ? 

A. Yes, sir; it would be a respectable place. 

Q. Is the sale any more innocent in a respectable place, than it is any- 
where else ? 

A. I would have it so that the moment he violated the privilege his license 
should be taken away from him ; that would be my way, sir. 

Q. Can you tell me the habits of the people of your community as long 
ago as 1827 ? 



APPENDIX. 383 

• 

A. Very much the same as they are now. We are called stereotyped 
towns. 

Q. Is liquor as common as it was forty years ago ? 

A. From forty to sixty years ago most everybody drank in those towns, 
moderately. 

Q. Did they not drink it daily and esteem the article a necessity ? 

A. I can remember when our merchant kept it for sale the same as he did 
tea and coffee. 

Q. Were you in a store forty years ago ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. But the storekeepers kept it, did they not ? 

A. I should think they did even a great deal longer ago than that. I. 
cannot give you the time, but I can recollect those days. I should think it 
was as much as fifty years ago. 

Q. Was it not the custom at that time for storekeepers to bring up hogs- 
heads of rum from Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir ; they would bring it up from Hartford. 

Q. Were there any distilleries in town ? 

A. There used to be one where they distilled cider-brandy. 

Q. Did you not use to have, a good many drunkards ? Do you not think 
there was four times as much liquor drank then as there is now ? 

A, I should not think so. 

Q. Was there not four times as much per head then as now ? 

A. I cannot say but that there was. I know that if they drank it they 
went off steadier. 

Q. Did they not drink four times as much per head as they do now ? 

A. I could not say as to that. 

Q. Did they not drink three times as much per head as they do now ? 

A. Well, I will split the difference with you and call it twice as much. 

Q. They had a license law then did they not ? 

A. In those days I believe they had licenses. 

Q. Stringent ? 

A. I think not. 

Adjourned. 



384 APPENDIX. 



ELEVENTH DAY— EVENING. 

Friday, March 8, 1867. 
The Committee resumed the hearing of testimony at 7 o'clock, P. M. 

Testimony of Dr. Edward IT. Clark e. 

Q. (By Mr. ANDREW.) How long have you been a Doctor of Medicine ? 

A. About twenty years. 

Q. Did you study in this country solely ? 

A. I studied in this country and in Europe. 

Q. Where in Europe did you study ? 

A. In Paris, in Berlin, and in Vienna. 

(2- You are a practitioner of medicine in this city ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Do you hold any office in the Medical Department of Harvard Col- 
lege V 

A . I am the Professor of Materia Medical 

Q. How much time have you spent abroad since you have been a man 
and while you wore in pursuit of your studies? 

A. Between five and six years. 

Q. Have you ever resided in a vine-growing country ? 

At 1 have. 

(). Have you taken any pains to observe the,effect, the moral and physical 
effect, produced by the employment of wine in vine-growing countries as a 
part of the alimentation of the people ? 

A. I never had my attention particularly directed to that while living 
there, any more, than any person residing there would be likely to have his 
attention called to it. I lived at one time for about three years in an almost 
exclusively vine-growing country, and I looked upon the light, wine there 
produced as being an addition to the comfort and sustenance of the people. 

(>. What was the apparent effect, if any, produced by the use of wines 
upon the sobriety of the people ? 

A. I could only answer from observing in a very general way, as any 
traveller would do, that I saw but very little drunkenness. 

Q. You have had occasion, have you not, both as a practising physician, 
and also as a lecturer and professor of Materia Medica, to consider the 
relation which alcoholic stimulants bear to the human system? 

A. I have been obliged to do so in order to discuss the matter at the 
College? 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state what is the relation which alcoholic; 
stimulants bear to the human economy, whether dietctieally or medicinally ; 
and if there is any class of them which may be considered materially different 
from any Other class'? Make the discrimination in your own way, and also 
discriminate, in your own way, between their dietetical and medicinal uses. 



APPENDIX. 385 

A. The question is so general) that it would be almost impossible to give 
anything but a general answer. In the first place, the different alcoholic bev- 
erages differ SO much from each other, that it would be impossible to classify 
them under one head. They vary not only in the amount of alcohol they 
contain, but in other ingredients, some of whiuh are even more, important than 
the alcohol ; so that to describe the medicinal or dictetical value of alcoholic 
beverages, as a class, I think would be impossible, except in a very general 
way to say that they exert a certain general action. 

Q. Are, or are not, alcoholic stimulants administered by the profession, 
medicinally ? 

A. They are. 

Q. For what purpose, gcuerally ? 

A. To answer that question, I should have to take each liquor by itself; 
they are characteristically different. There are certain ones of them that an; 
classified together, under the name of ardent spirits, such as brandies, whis- 
keys, etc., and they are materially different from the wines, and the three are 
materially different from beer and ale. 

Q. Are the different species of ardent spirits materially different in their 
action from each other V 

A. In some respects they arc, and in other respects they arc not. So far 
as you use anything that is pure alcohol, or alcohol diluted with water, the; 
action would be the same. 

Q. There is a substantial difference, for instance, between the action of 
brandy and the action of St. Croix rum ? 

A. I should want to see the articles and know what they were made from, 
to answer. 

Q. Is there any dietetic use of any of the alcoholic drinks ? 

A. There is. 

Q. Will you describe or define it ? 

A. Perhaps the most general statement that I could make, that would 
cover the ground of your inquiry, would be something like this. Stating in 
the first place, in addition to the difference that I have mentioned, that 
alcoholic beverages vary very much with regard to each other, that they also 
vary in their action with regard to the individual taking them, and are also 
varied in their action by the condition of the individual at the time, varying 
precisely as many articles of food, as many articles of drink, as many 
medicines do ; so that allowing for these differences, which may change 
the result very materially, we find that alcoholic beverages or drinks, to a 
greater or less extent, when applied locally, irritate the part with which they 
come in contact, that irritation vary soon passing away (depending upon the 
strength of the solution), and leaving the part as healthy as it was before 4 . It 
it is continued in contact long enough it may produce a disease there. When 
taken internally they stimulate more or less the different functions of the 
system, depending upon the amount taken, upon the character of the indi- 
vidual, and upon the character of the liquid. That stimulation may last for 
a short time, and then pass entirely away with no ill effects, or it may be. 
Continued long enough to produce dangerous effects upon the system. When 
taken into the system they may, and they do in certain stages of their prog- 
49 



386 APPENDIX. 

ress, arrest the disintegration of the tissue which is going on. That arrest is 
oftentimes productive of good ; it may go on far enough to be productive of 
evil. Thus you have a constantly varying action, which may do good or 
which may do harm, which will do good in some cases and which will do harm 
in others^ depending entirely upon the dose, the condition of the individual, 
the character of the liquid and the way it is taken. 

Q. Then if I understand you correctly, you cannot affirm of a small dose, 
that it will produce an effect characteristically like that produced by a larger 
dose, only in a less degree ? 

A. Not at all. The effects may be and often are characteristically 
different. 

Q. Do you think that the wine, as used by the inhabitants of some parts 
of Europe with their meals and as a part of their daily food, does, when thus 
taken and in that combination, produce the effect of food ? 

A. That question could be answered only by knowing the condition of 
the individual thus using the wines. They may and often do act the part of 
food in the system, or they may not act the part of food, depending upon the 
circumstances of the case. They replace food under certain circumstances. 

Q. You have read, I suppose, of Cornaro, the Italian nobleman, who lived 
for over fifty years, upon twelve ounces of bread and fourteen ounces of wine, 
per day. In that case, did the wine sustain alimentation ? 

A. Undoubtedly it did; and since then, other experiments have demon- 
strated, that without a sufficient amount of food, the system may be sustained 
longer if wines are taken, than if they are not taken. 

Q. The distilled liquors are often prescribed by the medical profession, 
are they not ? 

A. They are. 

Q. And different descriptions of distilled liquors are prescribed to different 
patients, according to the circumstances ? 

A. They are, just as other drugs are administered; the doses varying as 
much. It is my habit to instruct the class coming before me, to vary the char- 
acter of the alcoholic liquid, and the dose that is given, in accordance with 
the condition of the patient, with as nice a discrimination as they are capable 
of making. 

Q. Then I understand you, that under given or proper circumstances, 
alcoholic drinks, or some one of them, may be classified with food, for all 
practical purposes ? 

A. They may produce the effect of food in the system, under certain 
circumstances. 

Q. You recognize, then, if I understand you, that there is both a 
scientific and a practical difference between a stimulant dose and a narcotic 

dose ? 

A. We do. There is both a double and a treble action of many liquids, 
and alcohol is no exception ; in certain doses it produces an effect which is 
characteristically different from the effect produced by any other dose. 

Q. Is that not also true of other narcotics, like tea and coffee ? 

A. It is ; and also of tobacco, opium and Indian hemp. 



APPENDIX. 387 

Q. Do you find, in scientific research, any general tendency, throughout 
history and throughout the different regions of the globe, where mankind 
have been distributed, to the use of narcotic stimulants ? 

A. I think there is. There is a class of agents which tend to check or to 
retard the disintegration of tissue. In the process of life, there is going on 
all the time, a construction, or a building up of the system, and a destruction 
or a wearing away, which is continued every moment of life ; and certain 
agents tend to retard one or the other of these processes, or to increase one 
or the other. We find, all through the world, tea, tobacco, fermented liquors, 
or alcoholic beverages, distributed wherever the human race are to be found, 
and they seem to afford the opportunity of checking a too rapid destruction 
of the tissues, just as other means are employed to increase the construction, 
and so keep the balance right and the individual in health. Alcoholic bev- 
erages, including all under that name, come in that general class. 

Q. Can you or can you not, in all cases, substitute what is properly called 
food, and thus get along without these stimulants ? 

A . You cannot ; the process sometimes will not go on without something 
to aid it ; or it will go on imperfectly, if at all. 

Q. In the work of alimentation, then, nature has to provide, both for the 
construction of tissue, and also, under certain circumstances, prevent the too 
rapid destruction of the tissues ? 

A. Undoubtedly; and means are to be found by which those processes 
can be modified in either direction. 

Q. Is it suggested by any of the physiologists, that to arrest the destruction 
of tissues is to interfere with the order of nature ? 

A. I never met with such a statement. The destruction must necessarily 
go on, and to arrest the normal cause would be to interfere with it. I do not 
remember having met with the statemeut you have mentioned. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to describe the sort of cases in which it is 
desirable or useful to arrest the destruction of tissue by these means or by 
similar means, other than cases of positive disease, like that of typhoid fever, 
in which they give whiskey, or tubercular diseases in which they also admin- 
ister it. 

A. There are very few persons in the community in perfect health, probably 
not one of whom you could say with absolute certainty that every part of his body 
was in a state of perfect health, but for average individuals, who are in average 
health, you will find that with some, the digestion is imperfect ; the food can- 
not be converted into bone and flesh and brain, because there is an insuffi- 
cient power in the machinery to work it up into that material ; there are 
certain conditions of that sort, where the addition of some kind of stimulant — 
which might in one case be one kind, and in another, another kind — will 
enable that process to go on very perfectly, perhaps as perfectly as it does in 
the average of cases. Under those circumstances, a person may be about his 
ordinary work, seemingly very well, and yet requiring as an aid to his diges- 
tion, some agent which will enable the process of alimentation to go on, and 
it will go on much better with it than without it. Or, a person may be 
troubled with some sort of disease by which he is wasting away more rapidly 



388 APPENDIX. 

than the system ought to waste, so that the building up of the system is not 
equal to the destruction of it, and such a person becomes emaciated and yet 
is in a condition of fair and average health ; but such wasting away will tell 
upon him sooner or later. Under such circumstances, the use, as a part of 
food, of some agent like that we have described, will arrest the destruction, 
aid the process by which the system is built up, and in this way contribute to 
promote the health. There are a great number of cases of that kind, where 
the dietetic use of alcoholic liquor is so important, that I have deemed it 
necessary for years past, to give a lecture to the class upon 'the proper dietetic 
uses of this class of agents, pointing out the conditions when they are to be 
used, and the conditions when they are to be avoided. For it is always to be 
borne in mind, that with alcohol, as with all other agents of that class, the use 
of it in improper doses, at improper times, will carry the condition over to 
some sort of disease or malady, just as much as on the other hand, it will be 
favorable to health and tend to prolong life. 

Q. Are there any cases, that will permit persons who are properly regarded 
as in health, and who are pursuing their regular avocations for year after 
year, and making up a good average life by the aid of that sort of alimenta- 
tion, who otherwise would sink beneath the burdens and cares of daily duty 
and existence ? 

A. I meant to include what I suppose you refer to, under what I have just 
stated. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) In saying that each liquor produces its own 
peculiar effect, and the same liquor different effects in different quantities, 
you indicate the necessity of great skill in administering it ? 

A . Undoubtedly. 

Q. Would you think it at all proper, with a view to the uses which you 
have been illustrating, that each individual should be his own judge ? 

A. Just as much so as in the taking of tobacco, or of opium, or of Indian 
hemp, or of tea, or of coffee, — or nearly as much in taking tea and coffee ; 
perhaps I should not say quite. 

Q. Would you think, that omitting tea and coffee, that in any of those cases 
the general mass of the people are competent to prescribe for themselves ? 

A. Whether they are or not, we cannot help it ; they will do it. 

Q. But still your professional opinion would be of service in this matter ? 

A. My opinion would be, that after carefully explaining the principles to 
an individual I should say to him, that knowing these things, he must judge 
for himself, just as he has occasion to do in many other cases. I point out the 
principle, and then say to the individual, " Knowing this, you must now gov- 
ern yourself by what I have told you." 

Q. Would pointing out the principle to him, involve a discussion with him 
of the nature of the liquids prescribed, and the conditions of the system requir- 
ing them ? 

A. It would depend entirely upon his intelligence, who he was, and what 
I considered it necessary for him to know about it. 

Q. You would expect him to understand much more than you have 
indicated ? 



APPENDIX. 389 

A. Not more than I would in prescribing cod-liver oil to a person, when 
I would explain to him when it would be well to take it, and when to leave it 
off. 

Q. In that case you direct his use of the oil. I refer to the popular admin- 
istration of alcholic remedies. 

A. When people were sick, I should not. 

Q. Then when it comes to the use of alcoholic properties as medicinal 
agents, you would not ? 

A. When patients are sick enough to require the daily attendance of 
a physician, I should administer alcohol with the same care as the food, or the 
beef tea which the person is to take. 

Q. Are not the cases you have described as cases requiring alcoholic treat- 
ment, Gases requiring exceeding discretion ? 

A. Not more than the other cases that I have mentioned. 

Q. But are they not cases requiring exceeding discretion ? 

A. They are cases that depend entirely upon the health of the individual. 
I have, for instance, sent a person to go around the world, not expecting to 
see him again within a year, and directed him to take a certain quantity of an 
alcoholic preparation every day of his absence. 

Q. The same in the hot climates as in the colder ? 

A. The quantity would vary with the disease, and the condition of the 
person. 

A. As a general rule, what is the effect of alcoholic preparations in the hot 
climates, as compared with their effect of the same preparation in the cold 
climates ? 

A. Before that can be answered, you must state the condition of the indi- 
vidual, and the kind of beverage that is taken. 

Q. Is there not a pretty general rule upon the subject, although the details 
of application may vary ? 

A . I should think not. 

Q. Do you mean to say that alcoholic medicines produce an entirely 
different effect, or opposite results upon a given condition, upon one person 
from what they do on another person, in hot climates ? 

A. It would be impossible to answer that question definitely, without a 
more precise statement of the conditions, although I have lived for three years 
in a tropical climate; the conditions vary so much under different circum- 
stances. 

Q. Let me suppose a class of conditions. One individual has an insufficient 
quantity of food, from whatever circumstances you may please ; I understand 
you to say that medicinal administrations are advantageous in arresting the 
disintegration of the tissue ; what would be the effect of alcohol administered 
under such circumstances ? 

A. Dr. Hammond made an experiment touching that point, and found 
that he increased in weight while doing it. 

Q. Would he not, however, decrease in health ? 

A. If a person was in a perfectly sound state of health, he would ; if he 
was in that condition in which the 1 disintegration was going on more rapidly 
than he could bear, then it would be favorable to health. If the disintegra- 



390 APPENDIX. 

tion was not going on any more rapidly than he could bear, and enough was 
given to produce an arrest of the metamorphosis, it might have an unfavorable 
effect. This effect is not produced in all cases, as you can take it in doses 
which would not produce it. 

Q. I understand you then to say, that if a man is in perfect health and 
his digestive and secretive organs so act as to preserve his strength and weight 
and general health and condition, the introduction, in that case, of alcoholic 
or medicinal agents, would be deleterious ? 

A. Not precisely. I have no doubt that a person in perfect health (if 
you can conceive of such an individual) , could have a dose of alcoholic beve- 
rage given him, of a certain kind and in a certain way, so as not to impair his 
health in the slightest degree, and I can conceive of it taken in such a way as 
to injure it. 

Q. Allow me to ask, as a more practical question, whether the ordinary 
doses used in dram-drinking, in a case of general good health, can be expected 
to be otherwise than injurious ? 

A. Of what liquid ? 

Q. Any of the common, stronger drinks. 

A. I should want to know, before answering, just what you mean by a 
" dram dose." If it were four ounces, I think it would ; if it were half an 
ounce, it could be managed so as not to injure. 

Q. You made an exception upon the ground that few persons are in per- 
fect health; is it not your judgment that nine persons are in bad health from 
the use of alcohol when it is not needed to arrest the disintegration of the 
tissues, where one person is ill from the want of alcohol ? 

A. I do not know as I have ever heard that question raised, nor do I see 
how it could be got at, to prove it. At best, it would be but a mere matter 
of surmise. 

Q. Is that question any more difficult than those that you have been 
answering in the direct examination ? 

A. It is, materially. 

Q. We are supposing the condition of a large class of persons in ill- 
health, whom the physicians visit. Do you not frequently find persons in a 
diseased condition, induced by the unnecessary use of alcoholic beverages ? 

A . Undoubtedly, but I should say, so far as my personal experience goes? 
not a great deal oftener in this city than I do from the taking of opium. 

Q. That, I suppose, is not intended as a compliment to opium, but as a 
recommendation of whiskey. You spoke of alcohol when taken into the 
system, irritating the part it comes in contact with. Does it not always do 
that ? Is it not an irritant and a disturber of the human system, in and 
of itself? 

A. Locally brought in contact, it irritates for a short time ; that irritation 
then passes off and leaves the part just as it was before. If you increase the 
quantity or continue it longer, it may produce disease. 

Q. Which is the more hurtful, occasional inebriety, with considerable 
intervals, or daily dram-drinking ? 

A. Like all questions of that character, it is impossible to answer it, with- 
out more definitely fixing the dose. I have seen persons, from daily dram- 



APPENDIX. 391 

drinking, become thoroughly diseased, using that expression in its ordinary- 
sense. I have seen persons from occasional inebriety, in the same condition. 
If a person is taking spirits so frequently during the day that he does not 
allow time for its passing out of the system, he will undoubtedly experience 
an injurious effect. The point I wished to make was, that those questions 
could only be answered definitely, by definitely determining when it was taken 
and in what quantity. An inquiry concerning the effect of general, or of 
frequent dram-drinking is so general, that it will only admit of a general 
answer. 

Q. That is to say, the effect depends upon the number of drams per day> 
and the size of the drams ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. But as it is generally practised, — one or two glasses regularly per day 
of ordinarily strong liquor ? 

A . And how much in the glass ? 

Q. I am not in the habit of taking those drams ; I suppose that you can 
judge as well as I what passes for a glass of liquor ; suppose, for example, 
that a tumbler half full of whiskey was regularly taken once or twice per day, 
what would be the effect ? 

A . I should say that the practice would be dangerous if continued. 

Q. You are probably somewhat acquainted with the drinking habits of the 
community about us. The point I want to ascertain is, whether the usual, 
habitual drinking is or is not more injurious to the health than occasional 
inebriety, with intervals of a month or more between ? 

A . I do not think there is very much choice between the two practices. 
They are both injurious. 

Q. In relation to the influence of alcohol in a dietetic point of view, I do 
not understand you as saying that alcohol serves any other purpose than 
the arrest of the disintegration of tissue ? 

A. Yes, it does. 

Q. In the way of alimentary results ? 

A . It aids in the constructive work of the system, and consequently enables 
more food to pass into the system. 

Q. Does alcohol itself ever assimilate to any portion of the human 
system ? 

A. That is a question that is unsettled at present. 

Q. What is the general belief upon that subject? 

A. The best physiologists say that it is an undecided question; that 
experiments have not yet determined it. 

Q. Has it not been thought to be experimentally proven ? 

A. It has been. 

Q. By what method of proof? 

A. It has passed into the system, but all of its reactions in the system have 
not been detected. Consequently we do not know what has become of it. 

Q. How was the former position supposed to be proved ;— that it did not 
enter into combination with the system ? 

A. That was supposed to be proven because it was thought to be shown 
that all the alcohol that had passed into the system had passed out of it. 



392 APPENDIX. 

Q. How was that experiment made ? 

A. In various ways ; one by testing for alcohol in the various secretions. 
At one time some French chemists thought they had proved that the whole 
of the alcohol taken into the system had passed out, and so stated. 

Q. Did they state that they had detected an equal weight ? 

A. They supposed they had proved that the whole of the alcohol had 
passed out. They detected a certain amount that had passed out. 

Q. How did that amount compare with the amount taken ? 

A. It was less than five per cent. 

Q. Can you refer me to any work that sets that forth ? 

A. Doctors Lallemand, Perrin, and Duroy made the experiments. Experi- 
ments have since been made in Boston to show the same. 

Q. Do you mean to say that Lallemand detected less than five per cent, 
of the alcohol taken ? 

A. They professed to have detected the whole. 

Q. What amount did they account for ? 

A. They accounted for less than five per cent, as passing out of the sys- 
tem. That which remained in the system they did not account for. They 
supposed that they had proved the whole, and that was their error. 

Q. Do you mean to say that they did not actually detect five per cent, as 
passing from the system in the breath, in evaporations from the surface, 
and in the various secretions ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Was that the extent of their claim. 

A. Not the extent of their claim, but what has since been proven. 

Q. My question is not what other experiments have or have not estab- 
lished, but what proportion in weight of alcohol did they claim to have 
detected ? 

A. They claimed to have detected the whole. 

Q. The entire amount ? 

A. If I understand your question, they did. 

Q. My own impression was that they claimed to have detected very nearly 
an equal amount, leaving a slight quantity lodged, as they claimed, among the 
tissues. 

A. Their error has since been pointed out. 

Q. Will you show it ? 

A. They never have shown by their experiments (which have since been 
repeated in Boston and in London), that they got more than five per cent of 
the total amount digested, under any circumstances. 

Q. You would not claim, then, that the alcohol is transformed into any 
portion of the solids or fluids of the body ? 

A. That is a matter at present unknown. 

Q. In regard to the nutrition which is derived from some of the alcoholic 
preparations, I suppose you refer to the lighter preparations, and not to the 
stronger ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is the alcohol in any way essential to the nutrition contained in such 
preparations ? 



APPENDIX. 393 

A. I do not see how you could get rid of it. ,You could not have the 
liquid without the alcohol ; it is essential to the character of the liquid. 

Q. Is it demonstrable that the nutriment of these preparations cannot 
be administered in any other form ? 

A. I know nothing that will take the place of them. 

Q. You speak of diseases now, do you not ? 

A. Of disease in a general way. I speak of people who are well enough 
to be about their ordinary business, and are called well. 

Q. What do you think would be the result upon the general health of the 
people, if the whole community should determine no longer to take their 
aliment in the form of alcoholic preparations, bnt in some other way ? 

A. I think that they would seek some other sort of excitement. lean 
answer that question better by an illustration. At the close of one of my 
lectures upon opium, one of the class, who was formerly a druggist, from an 
interior town in the western part of Massachusetts, came into my room and 
said that he believed that in the town in which he lived the prohibitory liquor 
law was perfectly enforced. The town was so situated (being remote from a 
railroad) that there was no opportunity for dissipation, and but little opportu- 
nity for obtaining liquor. As far as he knew, that law was enforced. He stated 
that he had been a druggist in that town for many years ; that previous to the 
enforcement of the prohibitory law he sold opium only upon the direction of 
a physician ; since then he had sold for the last two or three years an average 
of one grain per day of opium, to every man, woman and child in that town. 
The people had sought another means of excitement, another stimulant. 

Q. That leaves my question unanswered. I do not ask what would be the 
effect if one stimulant was omitted and another taken up. We have been 
considering the effect of alcoholic preparations in an average state of health, 
which is a diseased state of health. My question is, suppose that form of ali- 
mentation was removed and no other substituted, what would be the effect of 
that removal upon the general health ? 

A . I think that is supposing an impossible case. I think, if you were to 
take away all the stimulants referred to % , alcohol, opium, tobacco, tea, coffee, 
cocoa, and the entire range of dietetic stimulants of that sort, that the effect 
would be injurious. 

Q. Suppose that all but tea, coffee, and cocoa were omitted. There are a 
few men and a few women in this community that use tea and coffee or cold 
water, but no liquors whatever, nor opium, Indian hemp, or tobacco. Do you 
suppose those persons enjoy less health, upon an average, than those who 
habitually use alcoholic preparations ? 

A. I do not think that there would be any material difference between 
them. I do not, of course, refer to the excessive use of alcoholic stimulants. 
Suppose one class of persons to take a glass of sherry wine or a glass of hock, 
two or three ounces at a time, not more, and the other class to use tea and 
coffee, as you suppose, I do not think there would be any difference between 
the two classes ; one would be in as good health as the other. 

Q. But are you not, in your case, supposing a condition that requires a 
slight arrest of the disintegration of the tissue ? 
50 



394 APPENDIX. 

A. No, I mean such persons as you speak of. Suppose, if you wish, a 
community of one hundred thousand in perfect health, living without it, and 
another community of one hundred thousand living with it ; the first taking 
one glass (about two ounces), of wine per day; the second abstaining from 
wine. I do not think that there would be any difference in the health of 
the two communities. 

Q. Do you speak of hock, or the lighter wines ? 

A. I refer to the simplest of the lighter wines. 

Q. Would you make the same remark touching other articles sold as wine 
in this country ? 

A. I do not know what they are, so that I could not answer. 

Q. Have we, strictly speaking, any of the lighter wines in this country ? 

A. I suppose that we have, but a very few of them. 

Q. I understood you to speak of the simplest qualities of the lighter 
wines ? 

A. We have some of that quality, but not a great many. 

Q. Do you refer to such wines without any addition of alcohol ? 

A. I presume that we have some of that class of light wines without any 
addition of alcohol, but I have very little knowledge upon the subject. I 
lived for a long time in the family of a large wine-grower, and was told by 
him that he was not in the habit of enforcing his wines with alcohol, and I 
think that he was a man upon whose word I could depend. He stated that 
the wine that he sent to this country or to England underwent no change but 
the ordinary fermentation. 

Q. Summing up then, you would say, that between the small amount of 
alcoholic preparations of the lighter kind which you say is not incompatible 
with good health, and the current, drinking usages of society, there is a very 
wide gulf? 

A. I should say there is. There is a tendency, however, with all persons 
taking stimulants, to increase that stimulant. I observe that all appetites 
tend to their own gratification, and I should place the appetite for stimulants 
under the same general law, as the other appetites. 

Q. Do you think that the ordinary appetite for food is open to precisely 
the same danger as the appetite for manufactured drinks of the kind of which 
we are speaking ? 

A. To not precisely the same danger, it is different, but still it is open to 
considerable danger. I think one of the greatest dangers of any in this com- 
munity, so far as my observation goes, lies in the use of opium. 

Q. Do you conceive that in the testimony you have given, that there is 
anything that should encourage the present drinking usages of the community 
about us ? 

A. It is difficult to answer so general a question, but without wishing to 
split hairs at all, I answer, that in one sense, I look upon the drinking usages 
of society as very injurious. 

Q. In what sense ? 

A. Drinking to excess. The answer will perhaps be more in the spirit of 
your question, if I say, that so far as I. can watch the community that I am 
called to visit professionally, so far as I can observe, I look upon the usage 



APPENDIX. 395 

of drinking as one that must be governed by the intelligence, by the character, 
by the force of will (if you choose to put that in), of the individual, and 
that it can be regulated in no other way. 

Q. Granting that, is it not desirable by every consideration that may be 
drawn from science, from good morals, from the good order of society, from 
the influence of the law, from personal example, to restrain and diminish the 
use of liquors as a beverage, with a view of going back to a normal, healthy 
condition of appetite and body ? 

A, There again, comes up the question of what would be a legal and 
proper way of restraining. I have no sort of question that every appetite 
should be kept in a proper limit and restraint, and that every person (includ- 
ing those who use alcoholic beverages), in every way, should be taught to 
restrain his appetites within proper limits, and that neglect of that opens the 
way to danger. 

Q. But are the present usages of the community within what you, as a 
physician, and a man of science, would consider proper limits ? 

A. Putting the question in that way, I should undoubtedly agree with 
you, that they are not. 

Q. It seems to be apparent that the use of alcoholic beverages, develops 
the appetite by a law limitless, demanding an increased quantity, but does 
that same law apply to food, demanding an increased quantity of that ? 

A . Not altogether. But I do not think that alcohol is an exception to 
other articles of the same class of stimulants ; the appetite grows with all of 
them. 

Q. We are comparing stimulants with food. 

A. That alcohol, or alcoholic beverages, or fermented liquors, are as 
necessary to the community as bread and milk and meat, I suppose that no 
one will maintain. 

Q. And no one would assert that they were as harmless, or as safe to be 
used, or as free from danger ? 

A. I suppose not. 

Testimony of Dr. James C. White. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you a practitioner of medicine ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In this city ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. For how long have you been ? 

A. For three years. 

Q. Are you also a professor in a Medical College ? 

A. I am one of the professors of chemistry in the Medical School of 
Harvard University. 

Q. I will ask you then, alluding to one of the inquiries put to Dr. Clarke — 
whether you as a chemist have had your attention directed to the subject of 
of the investigations made by Lalamand and his associates, as to the action of 
alcohol upon the system, and especially in reference to the question whether 
or not it was eliminated en totalite ? 

A. I have. 



396 APPENDIX. 

• 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state the investigations which you yourself 
have made and the conclusions to which you have arrived, and also state 
what is the present condition of scientific knowledge upon this subject ? 

A. Before the experiments of Lalamand, Perrin, and Duroy, which have 
been alluded to, it had been stated by some observers, that the alcohol had 
been wholly transformed into the economy, with the exception of a small 
amount which passed out through the lungs, immediately after being taken. 
It was transformed, according to some chemists, into one set of substances, 
according to others, into another set of substances, and finally escaped as was 
supposed, in the way of carbonic acid, by the lungs, &c. These French 
chemists showed conclusively, that that was not the case ; that a certain 
amount was eliminated in an unchanged condition ; that is, alcohol having 
been taken into the stomach, a certain amount passes out by the lungs, a 
certain amount passes out by the skin, and a certain amount by the kidneys. 
From their experiments, which were very carefully performed (and which 
have since been corroborated in every particular), these chemists published 
certain conclusions, one of which was, that alcohol was not a food, and on two 
reasons they based this conclusion : one reason was, that the alcohol was not 
transformed, at all, in the economy ; and the other was, that it was elimi- 
nated entirely. Their expression was " en nature el en toialite ;" that it was 
eliminated in natural channels and en totalite. So far as their conclusions 
are that alcohol is eliminated unchanged, they are correct, but their con- 
clusion that alcohol is eliminated en totalite is unfounded upon any experiment 
that they performed. Their published conclusions, that alcohol is not trans- 
formed into the system, are entirely of a negative nature. They simply 
proved that it was not changed into two other substances ; further than that, 
their experiments did not go. So far as the quantity goes, their experiments 
proved simply this : that, a person taking a given amount of alcohol into the 
stomach, a very small amount was passed out by the skin, a somewhat larger 
amount by the lungs, and as they themselves stated in so many words, the 
remainder is principally secreted by the kidneys. They performed several 
series of experiments to illustrate this, but so far as the quantity goes, they 
never succeeded in getting beyond a small percentage of the amount that was 
given. They proved, moreover, that alcohol ceased to be eliminated in a cer- 
tain time, by the lungs, in the space of eight hours, and by the kidneys in 
twelve or fourteen hours, and that after that time, no more escaped by either 
of these channels. They found by their experiments that in giving a person 
a thousand drachms of alcohol, they would get four or five drachms in the 
first half of that time. They never performed any experiments covering the 
whole amount of time in which they say the kidneys act in this way, and they 
also show that from hour to hour, the kidneys secrete less and less. During 
the time that the kidneys were secreting the greatest quantity, they got but a 
small percentage only. These experiments have been repeated at a much 
more recent day, and by men occupying as high a scientific rank, and the 
result of all the experiments is precisely the same. But the conclusions to 
which these other chemists have come are quite different. That is, they find 
a small percentage of alcohol secreted, but they say that any conclusion as to 
quantity, based upon that amount, is unfounded; that they cannot assert, 



APPENDIX. 397 

from finding a small amount, that all is secreted. And this is the opinion of 
all the scientific men, that I know, at the present day. Moreover, experi- 
ments have been made by other chemists, by taking the whole amount of 
excretions passing within twenty-four hours, and with very much larger, and 
with very much smaller amounts than these French chemists used. It was 
found by them, that in the case of a person taking twenty-four ounces of 
brandy, from time to time, during twenty-four hours, the amount of alcohol 
discharged by the kidneys (which is the chief channel, according to these 
chemists), was very small indeed. The amount of fluid, containing enough 
alcohol to burn, which they obtained, was a very few drachms. So the 
conclusions of the French chemists were certainly unwarranted. They proved 
that alcohol was eliminated, but that only a very small quantity was eliminated. 
As to the other experiments, from which they drew their conclusion that 
alcohol was not transformed at all into the economy, it had been stated by 
another French chemist that alcohol was transformed into acetic acid or 
vinegar ; and they simply proved, in a very few experiments, that acetic acid 
was not to be found in the blood, and they inferred, therefore, that alcohol 
had not been transformed at all into the economy. We know that of the 
alcohol taken into the blood, a very small amount comes out from the blood 
unchanged ; a very large percentage, therefore, remains to be accounted for. 
What its changes are is a matter entirely unknown ; what becomes of it 
remains unproved. 

Q. Then what, if anything, have you to say in reference to the final con- 
clusions of those French chemists, that for the reasons they stated alcohol was 
not to be classed as a food ? 

A. That they offered no evidence whatever. 

Q. Is it not true that alcohols have been classified among food ? 

A. They have been. It depends entirely upon how wide a definition is 
given to the term food. There are many substances taken with food and are 
necessary to life, that do not go to form the tissues. Oxygen is far more 
essential to life than meat. Water is essential to life in building up the 
tissues, but does not enter at all into the formation of the tissues, passing in 
and passing out again in the same form. They are both food, although not 
transformed into the tissues of the body. If such a latitude of definition is 
given to the term food, alcohol may be considered in some instances to be 
food ; but if the definition of the term food is to be confined to meaning that 
only those articles are to be considered as food which go to build up the tissues, 
then alcohol is not to be classed as a food. 

Q. Would such a definition exclude also water from the category of food ? 

A. It would, and many other substances. 

Q. Assuming it proved that alcohol, when taken, is eliminated through the 
kidneys, is it not also true of other substances which are universally classed 
in the category of food, such as sugar, salt, etc. ? 

A. There are some substances of which the tissues always contain a certain 
amount, although they are not chemically combined, and for the. want of 
which we would suffer. If you put a certain amount of salt into the system 
it remains there ; if you go beyond that point the kidneys excrete it at once, 
and pass it out entirely, every part of it. Sugar, if taken in a certain 



398 APPENDIX. 

amount, will be disposed of in other ways. If you give more than a certain 
amount within a certain time, the kidneys excrete it in the form of sugar, 
unchanged ; so that the fact that some substances are eliminated by the 
kidneys in an unchanged condition, in no way proves that those substances 
are not food, nor that they are not beneficial. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you find water to be essential to the animal 
economy, although not assimilated ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you prepared to affirm the same of alcohol in any form, that it is 
essential ? 

A. Not in health. 

Q. What is the most important office of water in the human economy ? 

A. It is difficult to state. Like many questions in physiological chemistry 
(a science as yet in its infancy), it is impossible to give a definite answer. 
There are a great many theories. 

Q. Will you indicate what is commonly accepted as touching that fluid ? 

A. It preserves the fluids of the body in a proper state of solution, and 
acts as a solvent to many organic substances. 

Q. Are there any facts known to chemists which would tend to show that 
alcohol has any such useful office in the human economy while in a state of 
health ? 

A. No, sir; it remains with the blood, the same way that all fluids do. 

Q. That is, temporarily ; but finally, you cannot say ? 

A. I cannot say what finally becomes of it. 

Q. Is any chemical experiment necessary to establish the fact of elimination 
in some measure ? 

A. That is accepted as universally known. 

Q. Does not every man's breath prove that ? 

A. Of course ; that has always been known. 

Q. Whatever darkness lies around the problem of elimination, as you pre- 
sent it, is there anything in it establishing a presumption in favor of the 
habitual use of alcoholic preparations, by persons in .health ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) In respect to that particular proposition, do you 
agree or disagree with the ground taken by Dr. Clarke ? 

A. I agree with him in every particular. 

Q. There is a theory, is there not, among physiologists, which reckons 
alcoholics as in the category of foods ? 

A. In the acceptance of the term food, which I mentioned, that is, that 
there is evidence, from their physiological action, that under some circum- 
stances, they act as food, in the same way, for instance, that beef tea does; 
their effects are precisely the same as food, judging by their effects alone. 

Q. But for a person in natural health, it is more proper to resort to those 
articles which are known as the true food ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) In those cases in which you say that alcoholic prep- 
arations act precisely in the same way as beef tea, is it the alcoholic or the 
nutritive elements of the preparation that thus act ? 



APPENDIX. 399 

A. It is the alcohol alone. 

Q. Will you state that point once more ? 

A. I say that, under some circumstances, alcohol acts in precisely the same 
way, and its results are entirely the same as the results of beef tea. It acts 
directly and finally in the same way as beef tea. 

Q. Do you affirm, then, anything different from that affirmed by Dr. 
Clarke, which is that it arrests the disintegration of the tissue ? 

A. Without attempting to explain it, I speak of the result, alone. 

Q. Does beef tea arrest the disintegration of tissue ? 

A. It would if it acted as a stimulant, in the same way as alcohol. Beef 
tea is food, inasmuch as it contains nutrition, which is an integral portion 
of the tissues. Alcohol does not contain nutrition, but under certain circum- 
stances, alcohol seems to act in the same way as beef tea, both directly and 
eventually. That is to say, the strength is supported, and the weight ceases 
to be diminished. Beef tea would also tend somewhat to restrict, in the 
same way. 

Q. What is the normal action of beef tea, stimulant or restrictive ? 

A. Under these circumstances it is a stimulant, wholly. Its action is too 
quick to be restrictive. 

Q. You speak of diseased cases, strictly ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In saying that you know nothing to create a presumption that alcohol 
is assimilated into the human system, do you not separate it from such a com- 
modity as beef tea ? 

A. I do not understand your question. 

Q. In the absence of all evidence that alcohol in any case is assimilating., 
is not alcohol thereby separated from any other food like beef tea ? 

A. Yes, sir, in that sense. 

Q. Is or is not the theory stated by you, in answer to a question in the 
direct examination, as to the theory of alcohol being food, generally accepted 
by physiologists ? 

A. I think that it is. Liebig had a theory that alcohol was used to support 
respiration. 

Q. What is your opinion of that theory of Liebig ? 

A. That it is undemonstrated. 

Q. Is there any evidence to show that, in case of health, the human system 
has any less resisting power to heat and cold without, than with the use 
of alcohol ? 

A. It has been stated that persons who drank alcohol in cold climates, are 
not as well able to resist extreme cold as those who do not drink. 

Q. Do you remember Dr. Carpenter's theory upon that point ? 

A. I remember his doctrine, but I do not think that he made any 
experiments. 

Q. (By Mr. Avery.) Do you in your practice prescribe wines and 
alcoholic liquors ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In thus prescribing wine or liquor to be used by a patient, would you 
direct that person to the town or State agency to obtain the article ? 



400 APPENDIX. 

A. I would not. 

Q. Have you any particular reason for not thus directing him ? 

A. I do not know that I have any particular reason. I have no experi- 
mental reason. 

Q. Is it generally understood by your profession that the liquors obtained 
at the State agencies, are superior to those obtained elsewhere ? 

A. My impression is that they are not so good; but I cannot speak 
professionally. 

Testimony of Dr. E. IT. Clarke (continued.) 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You confine yourself to the scientific part of the 
question in what you have said, do you ? 

A. I endeavored to. 

Q. I want to ask you a question. You observe the evils of the excessive 
. use" of these articles. Do you not think that, if all distilled spirits were out 
of existence, considering merely the physical effects of their use, the world 
would be the gainer ? 

Q. (By Dr. Clarke.) By distilled spirits, do you mean to limit yourself 
to brandies ? 

A. (By Mr. Spooner.) I mean brandies, whiskey, and rum, and that 
class of spirits, but not including wines and ales. 

A. (By Dr. Clarke.) Yes, sir; I think it would be. Not but that an 
evil would be done, because there are diseases and various cases where these 
spirits are of advantage; but on the average (I suppose you refer to drinking 
in all classes and in every way), I think, limiting it to that class and leaving 
the others, that would be my impression. It would be merely a general 
impression. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Would you, on the whole, stop even there? Let 
us suppose ourselves shut off by a sharp exigency, not having what we do 
need sometimes. "Would the world be worse off? 

A . I am not so certain as to that. 

Q. I should like to ask whether, in your estimation, the Lord, in making 
the world, made alcohol in any way ? 

A. I think he did. 

Q. Where do you ever find it in a natural state ? 

A. If a natural man is. what a man is to grow to, and alcohol is the out- 
growth of what has been, I do not suppose that the Lord has yet made a 
perfect man. 

Q. Can you attribute the making of alcohol to the Lord in the way that 
you would the making of a reaping-machine ? 

A. No, sir, not in the same way. I think he made them both. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) In other words, in the light of a larger philos- 
ophy, since that is the view to which you have been invited, is not the use of 
this among the seductive agents and instrumentalities through which and 
through the management of which, the race has got to pass to its ultimate 
development and purification ? 



APPENDIX. 401 

A. When you get to moral and metaphysical questions, I feel hardly pre- 
pared to give much of an opinion. I suppose the human race were intended 
to work their way through the difficulties which surround them. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I would ask whether the world has not had suffi- 
cient experience in that article, and if it had not better stop its use as quick 
as convenient ? 

A. I think that when they reach that state they will wisely use it, and will 
use it only for the proper purposes. 

Testimony of Oliver Wendell Holmes, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) What is the name of your professorship ? 

A. Parkman professorship of anatomy and physiology. 

Q. What are the views, if any, to which you have arrived in reference to 
the proper place of alcohol in its relations to the human economy ? 

A. I think that alcohol, sir, is meant for use in the arts, for burning in 
lamps, and for various other similar purposes. Alcohol itself, I do not think, 
is an article which is used in the human economy. I have never known it to 
be drank unless some person may have been unfortunate enough to have 
drank it from the jars containing specimens in anatomical museums. 

Q. That question lays the foundation for the one next in order, which is 
this : have alcoholic drinks, or drinks into which alcohol enters as a constitu- 
ent in combination, any proper use in the human economy, dietetically or 
medicinally ? 

A. I think they have, both dietetically and medicinally. 

Q. In what way do they act dietetically ? 

A. They act as food — these combinations. 

Q. And also as medicine ? 

A. Of course. 

Testimony of J. B. S. Jackson, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Will you be kind enough to state what is your 
professorship ? 

A. Morbid anatomy. 

Q. Have you had occasion in your duties as a professor, and also in your 
practice as a medical man, to consider the relation which alcohol, or any prep- 
aration into which it enters, bears to the human economy, whether used 
dietetically or medicinally ? 

A. I have, sir, been struck with some observations bearing upon this 
point. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state what they are ? 

A. I have met with diseases, not unfrequently occurring in persons who 
had used liquor to an inordinate extent, which I suppose I had reason to think 
was owing to such use. And I was struck with the fact at the time that I 
made the examinations to which I refer, that a very important class of diseases 
seemed to be rather unfrequent in those who had been addicted to the use of 
their liquors. That observation I made perhaps twenty or twenty-five years 
ago, and I believe it was then for the first time made. And it has been con- 
firmed in different cases since, quite a number of times. And in fact, I 
51 



402 APPENDIX. 

received communications from different individuals subsequently in regard to 
it, saying that the observations which I had made they had also made. 

Q. That they acted rather to prevent this class of diseases ? 

A, That they acted to prevent rather than otherwise. 

Q. What diseases do you refer to ? And what articles ? 

Q. I refer, speaking of the diseases that seemed to be attributable in a few 
cases to the use of liquor, to certain diseases of the kidneys which have only 
been observed in modern times ; and also to diseases of the liver. Both of 
these are common diseases. But I would also say, that both of these diseases 
I have often met with anatomically in persons perfectly temperate. But, upon 
the other hand, I refer to tubercular disease, which is so common that it 
is said that, in the temperate regions, it destroys about one out of every 
five or six in the community, as it has been observed in various countries. 
This is the result in Europe, and in the observations which I have made 
I came to the same conclusion — one in five and a half. I had occasion 
several weeks ago to refer to these observations of my own, so that I 
can speak definitely. And in these observations I noticed a fact which I had 
not thought of before. It was not until I had proceeded some way that I 
noticed that quite a number of the grossly intemperate subjects that I exam- 
ined had perfectly healthy lungs. From that time I went on and examined 
all the cases with this point in view, to ascertain whether those who had per- 
fectly healthy lungs had been temperate ; and, in regard to those whom I knew 
to be grossly intemperate, whether they died of consumption, and whether 
they showed that there had been formerly tubercular disease. And I arrived 
at the conclusion that I just now stated. 

Q. Is any kind of distilled spirit still prescribed by the medical profession 
now for the purpose of preventing lung diseases, or to retard their progress in 
the early stages ? 

A. I presume it is very well known to the public — the intelligent public — 
as to physicians in general, that in many cases of threatened consumption, 
ardent spirit is not unfrequently used. Of course the individual may, from 
time to time, be in a condition in which he may not be able to take it ; as, for 
instance, he may be in a plethoric condition, and then again he might be able 
to use it for months together. 

Testimony of E. N. Horsford, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Where is your home now ? 

A. Cambridge. 

Q. You are a chemist by profession ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you pursue your studies during any part of the time abroad ? 

A. Yes, sir, in Germany, with Liebig. 

Q. At what time ? 

A. Twenty-two years ago, I went there. 

Q. You were a student with Liebig ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long were you a student with him ? 

A- Two years, I believe. 



APPENDIX. 403 

Q. Are you familiar with his theory of food ? 

A. I believe I am, sir. 

Q. With his division ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What were his two general divisions of food ? 

A. He regarded food as being divisible into two classes, — one respiratory 
and the other nutritive. 

Q. What was the principal element which entered into that division of 
food which be classed as nutritive ? 

A. Nitrogen was one of its prominent constituents. 

Q. Had alcohol, or any combination into which alcohol enters, any place 
in either one of these divisions ? 

A . Yes, sir ; it would come under the head of what is called respiratory 
food, which includes starch and oil and those substances which, when burned, 
keep the body warm. 

Q. Have you any opinion whether any form of alcoholic drink does act as 
food? 

A. I have, sir. 

Q. What is your opinion ? 

A. I think it is food. 

Q. Will you explain ? 

A. It ministers to the strength of the organism, and it may also enter into 
the organism. It is allied to fat, and substances which produce fat. And in 
so far as it renders more perfect the digestion of food, meat and farinaceous 
food, it acts itself as food. Its action is to delay metamorphosis. It acts in 
that respect as the aroma of tea and coffee does, and as some of the essential 
oils do. Perhaps the most recent experiment that has been carefully per- 
formed, is an experiment going to show that all this class of bodies do actually 
fulfil the office of food, and that they do enable a man to perform feats of 
strength which he could not otherwise do. These experiments have been 
tried in Switzerland. I allude to Drs. Wislicenus and Fick. 

Q. Have you seen the report of their experiments which is in one of the 
recent numbers of the " Boston Medical and Surgical Journal ? " 

A. I have, sir. 

Q. Do you allude to that now ? 

A. I allude to the original of that, which I have seen published abroad. 
The property of alcohol as an antiseptic and as a stimulant, when mingled 
with food, and by means of which the digestion of food is accomplished more 
healthfully, is one of the offices to which I allude, when speaking of it as food. 
We know that it has the power of preserving the animal tissues ; we know it 
is a body which has an affinity for oxygen. We know that it is quite impos- 
sible to introduce it into the blood, which contains oxygen, without burning ; 
and if it burns it must give out heat, and in doing so, it fills the same office that 
oil does. And in providing for the slower digestion of food where, under 
other circumstances, it would be more rapidly digested, it is a healthful agent, 
and may be regarded as food ; and where it stimulates the digestive apparatus, 
where it would otherwise be retarded, it also acts as food, in that it has the 
effect of producing more matter which is assimilable. 



404 APPENDIX. 

Q. Then it is sometimes an antiseptic and sometimes a stimulant ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you make an essential and characteristic difference between a 
large dose and a small dose ? That is, does a small dose, a mere stimulating 
dose, have an effect characteristically like a large or narcotic dose ? Or is 
the effect characteristically different ? 

A . There are two stages of effect, one' of a stimulant and the other of a 
narcotic character, both of which have their office. If you mean to ask me 
whether, because it is a poison in its absolute purity, it is absolutely poisonous 
when in combination with other substances ; because there is acetic poison in 
vinegar, it does not follow that we may not therefore use vinegar ; or, because 
there is poison in the oil of pepper, that therefore we cannot use pepper. 
The essential principle of mustard and horse radish and a large number of 
condiments which in their dilution are not poisonous, act as a poison upon 
the human system, and yet the condiments themselves are very commonly 
used, and are found to be beneficial to a certain extent. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Is the regular progress of continuous disintegration 
of tissue as essential as a condition of health as the formation of tissue ? 

A. If you refer to the normal condition, it is important. 

Q. When you say that alcohol may arrest and preserve the tissue, may 
you not say that it might produce disease in that way ? 

A. I conceive not. It is simply a preservation of the body. 

Q. May not that be carried too far ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. In any case where the human economy is stimulated, by the use of 
alcohol, however it may be used, to extraordinary exertion, is it, or not, 
followed by a relative prostration ? 

A. The same as activity, under the natural stimulus of food, given to a 
certain extent, is proper. 

Q. If you withhold the food and use stimulants, is not the prostration 
greater than when you use food simply, and put forth an effort ? 

A. I think that depends upon circumstances. You may take food and 
not digest it for a time. 

Q. If you supply a certain amount of activity by a stimulant in place of 
food, does the same condition remain as if only food had been used ? 

A. The assumption, I take it, in the question is that there is perfect health 
in the outset. 

Q. Take any one of the gentlemen before us, will not great exertion, 
under the effect of alcoholic stimulants, be followed by a prostration which 
would not follow from the same amount of exertion on the basis of food ? 

Q. (By Mr. Hosford.) That is, is it not on the whole, if you wish a 
given amount of exertion, better to base it on food than on alcohol ? 

A. (By Mr. Miner.) Yes, sir. 

A. If I could prescribe the conditions, I would say, yes ; but I would say 
it with the limitation that you do not have a condition in which that could be 
infallibly responded to. 



APPENDIX. 405 

Q. Of course I understand you to leave the door open for extraordinary- 
cases. But you would not suggest that alcohol produces all the effect of 
food ? Basing exertion upon it, you would not leave the proposition there ? 

A. I do not quite get your idea. 

Q. Do you think that a man may labor a year in carrying brick up a 
forty-foot ladder, as well upon the stimulus of alcohol as he would upon 
bread ? 

A. I have this experience, that during my life in Germany, I saw my 
associates drink their light wines continuously, and I saw but one drunken 
man while I was there. 

Q. Is alcohol any considerable element in these drinks in your judgment ? 

A. My impression is that they aid digestion. 

Q. Do you assume that digestion always needs aids ? 

A. I think there are rare instances in which we do not need the assistance 
of some such stimulants as tea or coffee. 

Q. Does tea produce all the effects of alcoholic stimulants ? Is it not 
prescribed within far better limits ; that is, the ordinary consumption of it ? 

A. I think there might be more said in favor of it. You cannot get 
intoxicated with it so well. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) If the question was asked you, whether God 
made or produced alcohol, what should you say ? 

A. I should say he did. Absolute alcohol is something that probably 
nobody in this room ever saw. 

Q. You only mean to say that pure alcohol is not found except in combina- 
tion with other substances ? 

A. It is something which is spontaneously produced at times, and does 
not require the operation of human agency in order that it may be produced. 

Q. Is that spontaneous product a step towards destruction ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And is not produced by any mechanical or chemical action ? 

A. It requires no extraordinary action. 

Testimony of Henry J. Bigelow, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are both a practising physician and surgeon ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Were you in part educated abroad, on the continent of Europe ? 

A . I studied abroad some three or four years, about twenty years ago. 

Q. How much time did you spend abroad ? 

A. About three years. 

Q. Have you revisited Europe since then ? 

A. I have been there at two intervals. 

Q. Did you travel pretty extensively on the continent ? 

A. Yes, sir. I have travelled as most people do, north and south. 

Q. In what countries ? 

A> England, France, Italy, Egypt, Germany, Switzerland, and other 
places. 

Q. Have you any opinion as to the effect produced upon the health of the 
people of the vine-growing countries, by the use of wine as a daily beverage ? 



406 APPENDIX. 

A. I should judge from observation of people as you see them, and from 
the entire absence of evidence of the injurious effects, that it was not 
injurious in any way. And I infer that it might in some cases be beneficial. 

Q. What did you observe in your several visits in reference to the 
sobriety and the habits of intoxication of the people there, either one way or 
the other ? 

A. I should say there was a very marked absence of anything like intoxi- 
cation as you see it upon the surface of society. 

Q. Do you say that in regard to those peoples who use wine daily as a 
part of their daily food ? 

A. I speak of those. 

Q. Is it, or not, your opinion that the wine that they used did perform 
the office of food ? 

A. I have no doubt that it did to a certain extent. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you attribute a good effect as food to the 
alcohol or the other ingredients ? 

A. To the alcohol in combination with other ingredients. 

Q. In relation to the influence of wine upon the general health, are you 
able to state whether the long-continued use of wine results in any common 
class of diseases, insanity for example, in any considerable number of cases ? 
Say, take it in France. 

A. Not to my knowledge, where taken temperately. 

Q. By temperately, you are speaking of its use habitually with the meals ? 

A. Habitually upon the meals; and based upon the fact that the light 
wines are constantly drank, year in and year out, in almost any community 
in France. 

Q. You speak of wines that have not been reinforced at all ? 

A. Of wines as they are found. 

Q. Is it not found that a very large per cent, of the insanity of France is 
attributable to the habits of the people in this respect ? 

A. lam not aware that it is, to the extent of insanity from other causes. 

Q. You would admit that wine is one of the causes ? 

A. When taken to excess, it is liable to produce intoxication, of course, 
and that produces insanity as one of its general results. 

Q. In regard to the moderate use of intoxicating beverages in this coun- 
try, have you observed that any class of diseases manifests itself as the appa- 
rent consequence of such use, though continued to be moderate ? 

A. Undoubtedly diseases occur in certain cases as the result of alcohol, 
but the same diseases result without assignable causes. A man who, you 
would suppose, would not resist the effect of alcohol, will live a long and 
comparatively healthy life ; while another man, whom you would suppose to be 
able to encounter the effect of comparatively large doses of alcohol, may suc- 
cumb. I do not think there is any doubt that in some cases it will produce 
disease. If you asked me whether there were certain diseases which have 
been recognized, and which are based on alcohol, I should answer, yes ; dis- 
eases of the liver for instance. 

Q. I would ask whether, in the numerous cases of supposed harmless use 
of liquors of different kinds, in men from fifty to sixty years old, they have 



APPENDIX. 407 

never received any harm from it ? Would you consider such use harmless, or 
would you expect to see chronic diseases resulting from it ? 

A. If alcohol were used to produce a stimulating effect alone, I should 
not expect diseases ; but if it were used to excess, so as to produce a narcotic 
effect, I should expect diseases to result. 

Q. Are these different stages of the same cause ? 

A. I incline to the belief that there is a characteristic difference. 

Q. So that one does not lead into the other ? 

A. So that you can put your finger upon the interval, and say that one is 
a stimulant effect, and that the other is a narcotic effect. 

Q. How is the stimulant effect, as compared with the narcotic effect. 

A. In the stimulant effect, the circulation is not necessarily accelerated. 
When we speak of the effect of alcohol, I think we are apt to associate a 
stimulated pulse with it ; and yet a man in a fever may take a stimulant and 
reduce his pulse. 

Q. Does it change the pulse by changing the general circulation of the 
system, as to the distribution of the circulating fluids in the system ? I have 
supposed that the use of alcoholic beverages changed the pulsations of the 
circulation in the system. Is that the case, or is it a quickening of the 
circulation ? 

A. That might be one effect. 

Q. When it reduces a fever, what is the effect ? 

A. I take it that it tends to reduce the circulation towards its normal con- 
dition. It is then called a febrifuge, because it drives out fever. 

Q. The broad question, whether the stimulative effects and the narcotic 
effects are characteristically different, stands relative to this question of the 
general effect upon the circulation, does it not ? 

A. The circulation may be affected by both the stimulated and the 
narcotized condition. In that way they stand related. 

Q. Are modifications of the circulation of the same general character, and 
in the same general direction when acting under the stimulating as when 
under the narcotic effect. 

A. I think not. 

Q, Not in the same general direction ? 

A. Not in the same general direction. 

Q. So that there is a change of direction, when the change passes from 
che stimulative to the narcotic effect. 

A. When you speak of direction, that gives an idea that there is a change 
upwards or downwards. There is a difference in the pulse under the stimu- 
lative and under the narcotic effect. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) I would inquire whether, so far as your observa- 
tion goes, the practice of physicians is to abstain entirely from the use of 
wine, or from any liquor as a beverage ? 

A. I should think that, as a rule, they did not abstain, sir. I should give 
that opinion with some belief in its force. 

Q. (By Mr. Avery.) With reference to the prescribing of wine or 
ardent spirits, has, or not, that practice grown within the last ten years among 
practitioners ? 



408 APPENDIX. 

A. I should say that the beneficial effects of wines and spirits as a stimu- 
lus, were better understood than formerly ; that while, formerly, the stimulat- 
ing and narcotic effects were confounded, the stimulative and beneficial effects 
are now better understood. It is understood that a man may increase vitality 
for the time being — may make himself better able to work for the time being, 
by using these wines and stimulants ; and from the fact of their being better 
understood by the physicians and the public, I have no doubt that their use 
has been increased in that way. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) As the practice of physicians is supposed to be 
weighty upon the general habits and health of the community (and I suppose 
you have reference to that), I would like to inquire if opium, so far as you 
know, is used among physicians at all ? 

A. A good many of my medical friends smoke. I think I do not happen 
to remember anybody that uses opium. 

Q. Do you regard your friends who smoke as, in that practice, acting upon 
scientific principles, and as exemplifying and practising what they have 
theoretically demonstrated ? 

A. I consider that when they smoke they really act upon scientific prin- 
ciples ; and that, whether intentionally or not, they do demonstrate and 
practise what they have theoretically taught. 

Q. Do you regard smoking as beneficial in any way ? 

A. As a stimulant ; not as a narcotic, but used in moderation. 

Q. Do you believe, as a general practice, that the human economy requires 
stimulants other than the food providentially placed before us would furnish ? 
Does the machinery of the human economy run better or longer with artificial 
stimulants ? 

A. I would answer yes, in certain cases; and I will tell you why. 
Using stimulus at any given time enables a man who is a little exhausted, for 
example, to do more work at that time. It arrests disintegration for that 
time, and enables him to put his work into that particular time ; and in that 
way it is to be viewed as an immense convenience in the every-day workings 
of life. As disintegration (if you choose to go into it from that point of 
view) is temporarily arrested, he is saved from exhaustion, and enabled to 
do his work. At some subsequent time he must lie still, and, perhaps, he 
must give his machine an opportunity to catch up, for having taxed it at the 
moment that disintegration was arrested. If you compare this with his con- 
dition if he had been obliged to do a certain amount of work when he was 
exhausted, you will see the advantage. The man will come out at the end 
of the year stronger by having taken a stimulant at the time, and having 
rested afterwards, than he would if he had not. 

Q. That is, he would come out better in an extreme exigency ? 

A. I mean the exigencies of life. I do not mean an extreme exigency. 

Q. Do you believe that the ordinary usages of society require the use of 
stimulants ? 

A . Undoubtedly, like all habits, this habit is liable to excess. 

Q. Is that the strongest remark you would make ? 



APPENDIX. 409 

A. I should say that excess was not a good thing; but, for a little excess, 
you will find a vast amount of wine-drinking, and the stimulus, on the whole, 
to the advantage of the individual. 

Q. Do the people, generally, take it for the sake of the beneficial stimulus, 
or is it a fact that, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, it is taken, prob- 
ably, merely for the pleasure of the excitement that it brings ? 

A. If we were all perfect machines, my remark would not apply so gen- 
erally ; but, where people are over-worked, you will find a stimulus a conven- 
ient and often harmless thing. 

Q. Do you look for that time ? 

A. With moderate labor, there will be less need of stimulus. 

Q. With moderate labor, you withdraw the exigency. But withdrawing 
the stimulus, do you suppose that there is long life where the system is thus 
forced ? 

A. " Thus forced" is indefinite. 

Q. Forced as it is in the usual habits about us ? 

A. I have not assumed that it was forced. My statement was, that, if it 
were forced, and when it was forced, he is able to do more work than he would 
have been able otherwise to have done at that time. 

Q. This Committee are wishing to know whether the drinking habits of the 
community about us are, from a medical point of view, to be approbated, toler- 
ated, or condemned ? 

A. Well, under the term " drinking habits of the community," we must 
include a large proportion of temperate drinkers. There is a disagreeable 
association which attaches to the word drinker. If we include those who use 
wine as a moderate and necessary stimulus, and those who use wine to excess, 
I do not know that we are not as well off as any community. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) Do you include the use of distilled spirits 
also ? 

A. In answering the question whether the present drinking habits are ben- 
eficial or otherwise — is that the question ? 

Q (By Mr. Miner.) Yes, sir ; whether you include distilled or ardent 
spirits ? 

A. I have no doubt that, if we could practically exclude ardent spirits and 
fall back on wines, it would be better. 

Q. Is that possible in the existing state of the wine market ? 

A. That is a question of what is practicable and what is not. That opens 
the whole present question. 

Q. In speaking of the question as to the whole people, do you think that 
that answers the whole question ? 

A. I do not know that I understand your question. 

Q. The question was, whether the drinking usages of society, including all 
alcoholic beverages, are to be approbated, tolerated, or condemned ? You 
remarked that we were not any worse off than our neighbors. 

A. The first question is concerning approbation. I do not know that you 
can approve a thing, in which there are advantages and disadvantages, with- 
out going a good deal into the exact proportion of advantages and 
disadvantages. The next question is of toleration. That again raises the 
52 



410 APPENDIX. 

whole question. In reply to that, I should say that what could not be cured 
must be endured. 

Q. What for the third question ? 

A. That would raise the question whether it was to be condemned on the 
grounds of morality or expediency ? 

Q. Or health ? 

A. Health, also. 

Q. Or altogether ? • 

A. On the grounds of morality, I think it is not to be repudiated as a 
whole. 

Q. On the whole, you would say that the drinking usages of the com- 
munity about us are to be reprobated or deplored ? 

A. Deplored? No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) The question has been asked once or twice in 
regard to the wines prescribed by physicians here. I would like to ask you 
whether, in your practice, you are in the habit of prescribing wines to be 
bought of the State Agent ? whether or not these wines are used by the State 
Agent to your knowledge ? 

A. I can only give my general impressions on that point. I should not go 
to the State Agent for good wines or spirits. 

Testimony of D. H. Stoker, M. D. 
Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You have been a practising physician for many 

years in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you find any use for alcoholic stimulus in the profession ? 

A. Most assuredly. 

Q. What do you find to be its action ? 

A. Beneficial, or of course we should not give it. 

Q. What kind of action has it ? 

A. It is generally given where there is prostration and debility, to act upon 
the stomach and to assist digestion. We generally give it as a stimulus. 

Testimony of Charles T. Jackson, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You have been a chemist for many years ? 

A. I have, sir. 

Q. Not a practising physician ? 

A. Not a practising physician. I was originally a practising physician, 
but retired. I am engaged now more particularly in chemistry and geology. 

Q. What do you find to be the relations which alcoholic stimulants bear 
to the human animal economy ? 

A. Alcohol and alcoholic liquors act as respiratory food. When alcohol, 
either in the form of wine or in the form of any of our distilled spirits suffi- 
ciently diluted with water, is drank, it goes into the circulation. The alcohol 
takes the place of so much food in our bodies in the processes of respiration. 
The carbon and the hydrogen are oxydized and removed from the system, 
and thus save the consumption of just so much of our tissues. Different 
spirits and different wines contain different ingredients. Brandy contains 



APPENDIX. 411 

oenanthic ether, which stimulates the heart. Whiskey contains fusel oil, which 
operates upon the lungs and also upon the liver. Gin stimulates especially 
the kidneys; taken in excess it acts injuriously upon the liver. The moderate 
use of alcoholic drinks, so far from doing any harm to the human body, serves 
to sustain its powers of endurance, and saves the destruction of so much of 
our tissues, and is, therefore, conservative to the system. Wines contain 
(besides alcohol,) sugar, gum, tannin, in small proportion, cream of tartar, 
or bi-tartrate of potash, and several other substances, which also act as 
food. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How do you reconcile your testimony with that of 
Dr. Clark and that of Dr. White, who testified that the question of alcohol 
serving as food was unresolved ? 

A. I do not consider it unresolved. I heard but little of their testimony. 

Q. If I have not misunderstood these gentlemen, particularly Dr. White, 
it was, that while it had on the one hand been affirmed to be food, it had on 
the other hand been denied, and that it was really unresolved ? 

A. It is not so considered by scientific men generally. There may be 
some doubts raised by some persons ; but I think that the opinion of scientific 
men generally is the same on that point. 

Q. Do you speak of men in this country or of men abroad ? 

A. I speak of men abroad who have made these subjects a particular 
study. 

Q. Are you connected with Harvard College ? 

A. I have been. 

Q. Have you interchanged opinions with these persons who have testified 
here, who are connected with that institution ? 

A. I have never interchanged any opinions upon this subject with them, in 
conversation particularly. 

Q. You have not been able to agree with them ? 

A. I do not think that the question has ever been asked between us ; but 
that which I state I know to be a fact. In fact, sir, you cannot smell the 
breath of a drinking person without knowing that the alcohol is converted 
into something besides alcohol. You can smell the acetic acid in his breath. 
The alcohol has been converted into that substance and exhaled. 

Q. Do you mean to say that no alcohol is emitted from the breath ? 

A. There may be and there is probably a portion, in those who have drank 
to great excess ; but in a person who uses it steadily every day, you will 
always perceive this same fact. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Have you any acquaintance or experience with 
the quality of the liquors of the State agencies ? 

A . I had some at one time, and, unfortunately, rather too much of such 
knowledge. 

Q. Will you state what is their character and reputation ? 

A. So far as I know, the reputation is not very good ; that is to say, people 
have mentioned to me and complained to me of the quality of the liquors, and 
sometimes of liquors that they said were sold with my name attached to the 
certificates. I cannot prove it ; but I have no doubt that certificates of good 
liquors are used for selling very bad ones. 



412 APPENDIX. 

Q. That is, certificates of samples ? 

A. Yes, sir. I know nothing of the articles, except from the samples 
which are sent to me. I do not know that anything else is sold ; but I have 
had information from Vermont and from men out of Massachusetts, that my 
name has been attached to the poorest quality of liquors ; and I was so much 
disgusted with this that I called on a legal friend in reference to my resigning 
my connection with the liquor agency. He said that was none of my business. 
He said all I had to do was to examine the liquor that was brought to me. 

Q. These certificates had reference to liquors that were brought to you ? 

A. They were for liquor from that which had been brought to me for 
analysis. 

Q. During what period was that ? 

A. That was during Mr. Burnham's administration. 

Q. Do you say that persons are not satisfied with it ? 

A . I know merely of people preferring to send to New York for their liquors. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How extensive is that ? 

A. I do not know how extensive it is. This is told me by a person who is 
well acquainted with the State agencies, and knows the fact that many peo- 
ple prefer to send to New York, because of the unsatisfactory character of 
those liquors sold by the State agencies. 

Q. Who told you this ? 

A. One of the former State agents ; the agents, not the commissioners. 

Q. Do you recollect his name ? 

A. Yes, sir; but I have no right to give it here. I can give it if it is 
required. 

Q. Was he a man that was employed by the State agency ? 

A. Yes, sir; and resigned in disgust. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Do you personally know what kinds of liquors 
are sold by the State agents at present ? 

A. No, sir. # • 

Q. Have you known for the last twelve months ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you know anything but mere rumor ? 

A. Of course I have never had anything to do with it, except to examine 
the liquors which are brought to me. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) I would inquire whether it is a matter of reputa- 
tion among medical men using it as a medicine ? 

A. My more intimate acquaintance is with the office in Boston. But I do 
not think that the physicians care anything about the State agency. They 
send to the liquor-dealers who have the best reputation. I do not think that 
the physicians know much about the agency or care anything about it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Then they do not care anything about it ? 

A. No, sir. 

Testimony of Dr. George Derby. 
Q. (By Mr. Child.) Please state any observations that you may have 
made in regard to the workings of the prohibitory liquor law in the State of 
Maine. 



APPENDIX. 413 

A. I was a resident of Augusta, Maine, throughout the year 18G5, in 
charge of the United States hospital. I had a large number of men under 
my care throughout the year. They were more or less demoralized by the 
free and unrestricted sale of liquors, of a bad character, in that town. It was 
a source of a great deal of trouble to me, and one that I was not able entirely 
to remove. 

Q. Did you notice anything as to the fact of the use of liquor among the 
people generally ? 

A. There was a great deal of dissipation. 

Q. As well as among those under your care ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of Dr. Edward H. Clarke, (continued.) 

Q. (^y Mr. Andrew.) Did you hear the testimony of Dr. Jackson ? 

A. I did. 

Q. "Will you state to the Committee whether or not there is any difference 
between your testimony and his ? 

Q. Not at all. AVhat he said was perfectly correct, and entirely in 
accordance with what I stated. 

Q. Is there any difference between his testimony and the testimony of Dr. 
White ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Did or did not Dr. White testify directly that it 
was an unsolved question, whether alcohol was food or assimilated at all into 
the system ? 

A. I did not understand Dr. White to go into that. I saw no difference 
between the two doctors in that particular. The scientific points, as I under- 
stood them from Dr. Jackson, those stated by myself, and those stated by Dr. 
White, I should say were precisely the same. 

Q. Do you mean to say that your testimony and that of Dr. White entirely 
correspond, in regard to the transformation of alcohol in the human 
economy ? 

A. I do. 

Adjourned. 



414 APPENDIX. 



TWELFTH DAY. 

Tuesday, March 12, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the introduction of evidence 
by the counsel for the petitioners was concluded, with a single exception, by 
the testimony of the two following witnesses : — 

Testimony of Jules E. Souchard. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside at this moment ? 

A. In Boston. 

Q. What is your position here ? 

A. French Consul. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) How many years have you been French Consul ? 

A. Eleven years. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I wish to inquire of you in regard to the fact, 
whether French wines, as introduced into this country, are in the same pure 
state as in France ? Or are they fortified, as it is called, by the addition of 
alcohol ? 

A. It is my opinion that the French wine is mostly, if not almost every 
time, imported here almost as pure as it is used in France. 

Q. Is there any difficulty in importing it ? 

A. There is no difficulty. There is wine of course which cannot be 
imported at all; but every wine that can bear crossing the sea may be 
imported pure. And I do not suppose that the addition of alcohol would 
make it any better to bear transportation. 

Q. The light wines, the clarets, etc., do they come in the same condition ? 

A. They are covered by the same condition. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Are you in the business ? 

A. No, sir; I have no business except my consulship. 

Q. What is your knowledge of these facts ? 

A. I have imported wine myself, for my own use, for the last ten years ; 
and I always found it perfectly pure. I have bought wine here several times, 
and I believe that wine was adulterated. 

Q. Take the other wines, are you sure that they have not been in the habit 
of enforcing them with brandy ? 

A. I do not think that they enforce them with brandy. It may be that 
wine is sometimes enforced with stronger wine, in order to bring it to its 
proper standard. 

Q. Would it not be an easier process to put in a little brandy ? 

A. No ; brandy would be detected. 

Q. But it is the same material as wine ? 

A. But it would detract from the wine. 

Q. Do you consider yourself a judge in the matter? 



APPENDIX. 415 

A. I have not considered myself a judge in the matter any more than 
this, that any man who is accustomed to drink wine knows something about 
it. And besides that, my position here obliges me to be connected with 
importers of wine and to know about it. 

Q. I would ask if there are not a great many adulterated wines in Paris ? 

A. I think there are very few, because the law against adulterated wine 
is very stringent. 

Q. Is it always enforced ? 

A. Oh, yes, always ; as much as possible, at least. 

Q. Do you know that they do not import American whiskey and alcohol, 
to put into the wines ? 

A. I do not believe they import it to put with wine. They import whiskey 
and rum, but not for that purpose. 

Q. Is there not a great deal of talk in Paris about adulterated wines ? 

A. Of course there are some bad wines; and people are inclined to think 
that bad wine is adulterated wine. But it is a very difficult thing in Paris to 
have adulterated wine. 

Q. Are there not frequent seizures of liquors in Paris, and investigations, 
in order to learn whether the wines are not adulterated ? 

A. Yes, sir, — I do not know whether there are frequent seizures, but there 
are frequent investigations. 

Q. But you think that there are frequent cases where they are adul- 
terated ? 

A. Not very often ; but of course there are sometimes cases. 

Q. You say it is a very general impression that the wines of this charac- 
ter are adulterated ? 

A. No. I say the contrary. I say that my impression is that they are 
not adulterated. 

Q. Did you ever hear much of the Oporto wines ? 

A. Yes, sir ; but I could not give any opinion about them. 

Q. Did you never hear the historical fact that they were formerly sent from 
Oporto to the Channel Islands, ordinarily, and were there re-packed and 
sent to England ? 

A. No ; I never heard it. 

Testimony of Matthew J. Fassin. 
Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 
A. In New York. 
Q. What is your business ? 
A. Wine-importer. 
Q. What wines do you import ? 
A. From France and from Germany. 

Q. I would inquire whether wines are imported from France in their pure 
state, without adulteration and enforcing ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How is that fact generally ? Are they, as a general thing, sold pure ? 
A. As pure as the market of Oporto and Burgundy gives. 



416 APPENDIX. 

Q. Is there any difficulty in bringing them across the water without 
enforcing ? 

A. Not at all, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Is there much Oporto wine imported here ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Does it come direct from Oporto ? 
. A. Yes, sir ; through some of the Oporto wine is made in Marseilles. 

Q. What do you believe they do with it in Marseilles ? 

A. They have a heavy wine there which is only made in Marseilles. 

Q. Did you ever hear that some thirty years ago they used to import a 
good deal of Oporto wine and repack it ? 

A. No, sir, because I was not in business at that time. 

Q. Do you not think that they used to send hundreds and hundreds of 
hogsheads from the Channel Islands to England, where they did not send a 
single hogshead from Oporto to the Channel Islands ? 

A. I do not know anything about it. 

Q. What do you mean by importing wines pure ? Do you mean simple 
juice of the grape ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You think that is generally the case ? 

A. It is generally the case. Of course we have in France and in Bur- 
gundy inspectors of the amount of the revenue. And if it was a different 
Wine, then it would not be exported. 

Q. Suppose that, for instance, you take sherry, which has eight or ten per 
cent, of alcohol in it, and that you put in four or five per cent, of brandy, 
being the same material as the wine itself, can any chemist detect it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How is that possible when it is the same material ? 

A. It is not the same material. In making brandy, we are obliged to 
burn the grape. The wine is made by fermentation. 

Q. Then the alcohol of the brandy and the alcohol of the wine are two 
different articles ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are a native of France ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been in this country ? 

A. Since 1848. 

Q. Are you frequently there ? 

A . I have been in France five times since. 

Q. In wine-growing countries, how general is the use of wine among the 
people ? 

A. Everybody drinks wine, — the children as well as others. 

Q. Any intoxication ? 

A. No, sir; very little. The intoxication is sometimes from brandy, but 
not by wine. 

Q. How are the habite of the people in that country, as regards intoxica- 
tion, as compared with New York ? 

A. There is a very great difference. 



APPENDIX. 417 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Did you ever know of the habit of the laboring 
people of Paris to go on Sunday outside of the limits of the city, where they 
can get wine without duty, and their spending the day in drinking to excess ? 

A. It is very seldom that you find people drinking to excess. 

Q. Excess of wine does not show itself as excess of ardent spirits does 
there, I suppose ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. But does it not throw them into a stupid, silly state ? 

A. I have no remembrance of any cases of that kind. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Did you ever hear of insanity from the use of 



wines 



A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you any doubt that it exists, and that from the using of wine ? 

A. I do not think it does. 

Q. Have you seen a work, lately published by a certain charitable institu- 
tion, which gives information upon that subject ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would you be surprised to learn that a very large per cent, of the 
insanity of that country comes from the using of wines ? 

A . I should be surprised. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) In making brandy from grapes, would they do it 
without burning ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Can you get alcohol without burning it ? 

A. No, sir. 

A statement was submitted to the Committee in behalf of the counsel for 
the Petitioners relative to what was claimed on their behalf, as follows : — 

" 1. That the several municipalities of the Commonwealth be allowed by 
law to permit the retail sale, under municipal regulation, and subject also to 
police regulation by the Commonwealth, of spirituous and fermented liquors, 
by taverners, victuallers, grocers and apothecaries ; licenses being granted, in 
such numbers and to such persons as the public convenience may, in the 
judgment of the municipality, require. 

" 2. All licensed places shall be subject to police visitation, and the liquors 
kept for sale shall be subject to inspection under superintendence of a Board 
of Commissioners appointed by the Governor ; such regulations being enacted 
by law relative thereto as will best promote the purity of the liquors offered 
for sale, and guard the people against imposition by adulteration or otherwise. 

" 3. The existing provisions of law which forbid the manufacture of cider 
and its sale by the manufacturer, and those also which forbid the sale of spir- 
ituous and fermented liquors at wholesale (or in quantities of not less than 
twenty-eight gallons in each package,) and those which forbid their manufacture 
to be sold according to law, should be repealed. 

" 4. The provisions of the existing statutes shall remain in force against all 
persons manufacturing or selling contrary to law, whether without license or 
in violation of their license." 

The opening statement in behalf of the Remonstrants, was submitted by 
Hon. A. Huntington, and a brief further statement was submitted by 
W. B. Spooner, Esq. 
53 



418 APPENDIX. 

The Committee then proceeded to the consideration of evidence introduced 
on the part of the Remonstrants. 

Testimony of Charles Stoddard. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Will you state for how many years you have been 
a resident of Boston ? 

A. I have resided here for more than half a century. 

Q. What business and what church relations do you sustain ? 

A. I am a merchant and connected with the Old South Church. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state what views you may entertain on the 
question here in debate with particular reference to the policy of prohibition 
of the sale of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, or the license system ? 

A. I have been astonished, Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen, at what I have 
read, in the papers, of the testimony that has been given here in regard to 
going back to the dark ages. It is a most astonishing thing to me that good 
men (for they are good men), should advocate going back into the middle 
ages from the 19th century ; and such I regard going back to any sort of license 
law. And it has occurred to me, as I have read these reports, that most of 
those who have testified here must have been recently born. I have lived 
here fifty years or more, and have been acquainted with the conditions of 
things under both systems. We know what a license law is ; a stringent law 
and one that is not stringent. We know all about it. We have fought that 
fight and we are never going to return to it, sir, Mark my words. In this city, 
and in this town before it was a city, it was very difficult to deal with this 
matter. Mr. Quincy was our first mayor, with the exception of Mr. 
Phillips, who was here one year ; and a better mayor we never had. He was 
on his horse at five o'clock in the morning, and used to bow to me, for I was 
up at that time ; and he used to say to me, " If there is any stench around 
your house let me know." He went all around the city, and he hunted out 
the nuisances at the west part of the town, and he scattered the courtezans. 
Some people said that he scattered the disease, but did not destroy it. We 
have had a good many mayors since then, and we have had a good many laws. 
I think that the best law that has been on the statute book since I have 
been on the stage, is the present one ; because it is on the right principle, 
and that is on the principle of prohibiting that which is an immorality. Sell- 
ing rum to men and women in this Commonwealth for the purpose of gaining 
gold, is an immorality. If that which sends men to jails and penitentiaries, 
and that which fills almshouses with paupers, and that which fills the streets 
with men who are drunk, is not an immorality, there is nothing which is an 
immorality for which there is any statute in our law books, and every man 
knows it. It is an infamous business ; and the only inducement which there 
is to it which was ever advocated, was to get gold. It is gold versus misery. 
Now, if there is any law which the women and children are in favor of, it is 
the present prohibitory law. The women and children are against this law 
to a man ; and if you cannot fix it in any other way, let us have the women 
vote on it, and see how the thing will come out. 

Q. What is your condition of mind as to the influence of the liquor- 
dealers in this matter ? 



APPENDIX. 419 

A. I have not their acquaintance, sir. 

Q. How do they seem to like the present law ? 

A. Who is moving for its repeal, if they are not ? 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Perhaps Mr. Hardy. 

A, Mr. Hardy is drawn into a false position, as you know. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You feel it to be clearly a matter of fact that this 
is the liquor-dealers' enterprise ? 

A. It is a question between gold and those who are not making it in this 
traffic. 

Q. Do you suppose that a license system could be made to interfere with 
the traffic as it is at present ? 

A. I do not know, sir. I was foreman of a grand jury of this Common- 
wealth in 1843, and if you will allow me I will make a reference to the 
finding of their inquest : of the cases that came under their cognizance, during 
three months, two hundred and nine were against morals, and one hundred 
and nine against property ; almost two to one. The cases against morals 
were brought against the sale of ardent spirits. I think at that time there 
were no licenses in Boston ; but there were people selling, and selling after 
midnight on Saturday. That is the testimony that came before the grand 
jury at that time. It was in evidence before the grand jury, that more than 
one hundred persons, mostly young men, were passed by one of our city 
police officers between the hours of twelve and two o'clock on Saturday 
night, in his walk between Cornhill Square and Cambridge St., all in a state 
of partial or entire intoxication. They were Cambridge students and others, 
who came down to Cornhill Square, which was a capital place in those times 
to get liquor ; and they went home in this condition, to the great detriment 
of the public peace and order. 

Q. What is your opinion in respect to the efforts to execute the present 
prohibitory law in Boston ? 

A. So far as I have been able to observe, sir, with the exception of the 
efforts of the State Constabulary force, there is no effort at all. 

Q. Have you, at any time, so far as you have been able to observe (and 
you have been, I suppose, a constant observer), been able to find that any of 
the authorities of the city, have shown any disposition to execute the present 
law ? 

A. Very little, I think. I would not make a sweeping assertion, but there 
has been nothing like what there should have been. I have not been familiar 
with these things. 

Q. There has been much testimony introduced here in regard to the 
increase of intemperance in the city. Among what portion of the inhabi- 
tants, American or foreign, according to your judgment, has there been an 
increase ? 

A. The testimony has been that the prohibitory law made this increase, 
though I have not been able to see it in any glasses that I have had. There 
have been many causes in the last few years for an increase of intemper- 
ance. We have had a million of people disbanded from the army ; of 
course intemperance has increased from that cause. And then we have a 
foreign population which is being constantly augmented here. 



420 APPENDIX. 

Q. Are the habits of the foreign population, taken together, freer in this 
respect than they were ? 

A. Yes, sir. It is rare to find a foreigner that does not drink when he 
gets here. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the habits of drinking in higher circles, as 
compared with what it was formerly ? 

A. I think it is more fashionable to offer wine in houses than it was twenty 
years ago. 

Q. In what particular circles of the population of Boston should you think 
that true ? 

A. Well, sir; it is certainly true of the poorer classes. I do not know 
precisely how it is to the other. 

Q. Have you any reason to think that the middling classes in the city, — 
the laboring men of the city, — the tolerably well-to-do classes, are less given 
to the use of liquor than formerly ? 

A. I have no reason, from my knowledge, to think so. 

Q. What do you think would be the vote of the majority of the American 
population in the city on such a question as this ? 

A . Well, sir, I do not know. I have no idea. 

Q. You are yourself associated with the temperance enterprise, personally ? 

A. Well, sir, personally, I have never drank a glass of spirits to my 
knowledge since I was born. 

Q. You are, then, an original total abstinence man ? 

A. Yes, sir, before any society that I ever heard of. I never used to have 
it in the house, and never used to offer it to guests. 

Q. Then you see nothing that would lead you to favor a license law ? 

A. I should as soon think of travelling back to the dark ages, and to put 
out all the lights of science and everything else. I should go out myself, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You say it is an immorality to sell a glass of liquor 
to drink ? 

A. If I should answer that directly, I should say I did. 

Q. In what consists the immorality of that act ? 

A. The immorality consists in a man tempting a fellow-creature to do 
wrong. 

Q. Who does wrong — the man that drinks or the man that sells ? 

A. Well, sir, I have two passages of Scripture on that point ; one relates 
to the man who drinks and the other who gives wine to his brother : " Nor 
fornicators, nor covetous, nor drunkards, shall enter the kingdom of God ; " 
" Woe to him that giveth his neighbor drink, and that putteth the bottle to 
him and maketh him drink also." 

Q. Do you lay it down as an immorality to sell a glass of liquor to any 
individual ? 

A. I lay it down as an immorality to open a place to sell spirits for money, 
licensed or unlicensed. 

Q. How is it with regard to the State Liquor Agency, which sells liquor 
for money ? 

A. I am not familiar with its proceedings at all. I never went to it. 



APPENDIX. 421 

Q. Are you aware that more than half of the liquor that is made in the 
State of Massachusetts is used in the arts ? That out of ninety-three millions 
of gallons manufactured in this country, more than forty-three millions are 
used in the arts. Is it wrong to sell it in your judgment ? 

A. I do not regard it as wrong to make an article for that purpose, or to 
sell it for that purpose. It is for drinking and to make men drunk. 

Q. If a man goes and gets a prescription from a physician, and sends for 
half a pint of brandy, is it wrong that a man should sell it to him ? 

A. I should think it might be tolerated, at any rate. 

Q. Does it come under what you call sinful ? 

A. In that case I would make an exception, certainly. 

Q. Suppose you give a strong drink to him that is ready to perish. Is that 
a sin ? 

A . The Scriptures approve of it. 

Q. You do not mean to say, then, that every sale of liquor to be drank is 
immorality, do you ? 

A. I would qualify it, sir, certainly. 

Q. You do not believe it, do you ? 

A. I do believe it, sir, in the open and indiscriminate sale. 

Q. You do not believe then that the sale of liquor to be drank, is an 
immorality ? 

A. I do believe that it is an immorality for a man to open shop and sell 
liquor for drink. The physician orders it for him who has need of it, and 
if he has evidence that there is occasion for it to be used ; but the dram-shop 
is an immorality. 

Q. Granted. Now how is a license law that shall permit sales for those 
proper purposes and forbid it for all improper purposes, going back to the 
dark ages ? 

A. Well, sir ; that is really a dark problem. 

Q. Do you know, in your judgment, of any way in which the sale of 
liquor shall be better regulated ? You admit that there is a proper sale of 
liquor to be drank ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Can you devise any way in which the public can be secured against 
the improper sale and the public furnished with a proper article ? Can you 
devise any other scheme than the license law ? 

A. I have been told that the present law is a scheme which covers that 
ground. 

Q. Do you ever go for any purpose to the State agency ? 

A. No, sir ; not being unwell, I tlo not go at all. 

Q. Have you ever been to the State agency to get it for what you have 
used it ? 

A . I do not know anything about the State agency, personally. 

Q. Then how do you procure it ? 

A. I do not procure it. 

Q. I do not mean in any improper manner ; but where do you procure it ? 

A. I cannot say where it is obtained. I do not get it myself. 

Q. It is had in your family, is it not ? 



422 APPENDIX. 

A. Perhaps it is, a little. 

Q. Do you know what the provision of the present prohibitory law is ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. Do you think it is proper ? 

A. I think it is an eminently proper law ; but because there are some 
little difficulties do not go back to the dark ages. Our children are ruined, 
our wives are widowed, and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is injured 
for the sake of a few people getting a little more gold. 

Q. Do you recollect the time of the temperance reform in the days of 
Justin Edwards ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Do you think there was any progress made then ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Do you recollect that such was the law ? "Why do you call that going 
back to the dark ages ? 

A. Because I know what hindered the carrying out of the law at the time 
of Justin Edwards. 

Q. How was it stopped ? 

A. It was stopped in this wise : the family banished it ; the individuals left 
off ; the hay was cut without rum ; everything seemed to be going on brightly ; 
but the officers of the town were licensed and the liquor came in through 
them, and sowed destruction, woe and death. 

Q. Are you not aware that the selectmen of the town were authorized to 
license proper persons at that time ? 

A. In many towns they did and in some they did not. 

Q. Are you aware that there was a time when the towns could not get 
licenses from the county commissioners, who refused them indiscriminately ? 

A. There was a time when there were no county commissioners. 

Q. During the time to which I allude, when there were county commis- 
sioners, are you not aware that the county commissioners in most all of the 
counties, withheld all licenses ? 

A. They did, where the majority was right. 

Q. What was the fact about this majority in these years ? 

A . I lived in Boston and I cannot say. 

Q. Then you have no definite opinion as to what the state of things was 
in the country ? 

A. I have a definite opinion, but it does not go into the particulars ; that 
is, I could not specify individual cases. 

Q. Have you ever attended any of the examinations and testified here ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I have sometimes attended here. 

Q. If you could be persuaded that some law regulating the sale of liquor 
would really be less obstruction to the cause of temperance than the present 
state of things, would you be in favor it ? 

A. I should be in favor of the present state of things, for the reason that 
I cannot be persuaded, with the experience of half a century, that anything 
in the shape of a license will promote the cause of temperance or retard the 
cause of intemperance. 



APPENDIX. 423 

Q. You have had an experience of fifty years under the prohibitory law. 
Has the cause of temperance increased any during that time ? 

A. I have mentioned four cases beside that. 

Q. Is it, as a matter of fact, true that the cause of temperance has been 
retrograding in Massachusetts, according to your observation ? 

A. I think it has in some part of Massachusetts, sir; and in some part of 
the years, I think it has here. Some parts of these years I think it has been 
advancing, but there are various causes operating to effect these changes. 

Q. Is there more intemperance in Boston now, so far as you understand 
it, than there was a year ago ? 

A. No, sir, I think there is not so much as there was a year ago. It has 
astonishingly diminished since last May ? 

Q. Do you think it is wrong to sell a glass of sweet cider to anybody ? 

A . I am not familiar with that beverage, sir. 

Q. Taking it in the country, do you believe it is sinful for one farmer to 
sell a couple of gallons of sweet cider to another, — to sell a couple of gallons 
of sweet cider to his neighbor, or to make it ? 

A. That is a question of casuistry, and the matter of individual wrong or 
individual sin is very much involved. The schools have not settled it. 

Q. Is it a question of casuistry as to whether a man may sell a glass of 
sweet cider to his neighbor ? 

A. We are a set of sinners, and those who do not sell rum are no better 
than those who do ; but some men sell liquor for the purpose of getting money. 
I do not think that this present law will be repealed by the Legislature. Or, 
if it is repealed, the members will be unseated by their constituency. 

Q. (By Mr. Sherman.) If a man should drink coffee to excess, would 
that be called a sin ? 

A. There you have casuistry again. I really could not tell. 

Q. Do you think there is any immorality in drinking ardent spirits, sup- 
posing a man knows it hurts him ? 

A. I think it is wrong altogether. 

Q. But is it wrong because his conscience shows that it hurts him ? 

A. I have abstained on this simple idea: I do not like the idea of dying 
a drunkard, if I can help it. That is the simple thing which has restrained 
me. 

Q. I should like to ask whether the immorality consists in the simple 
drinking, or in the drinking under a belief that a man is not committed to the 
moderate use? 

A. I think that the whole question in regard to this subject rests upon the 
ground of expediency. I do not think there is any sin in drinking a glass of 
wine. I think all these things are matters of expediency. 

Q. Is there any sin, then, in drinking a glass of cider or wine ? 

A. No, sir, there is no sin in it. 

Q. Is there any sin in drinking a half a glass of brandy ? 

A. There is casuistry again. I do not know the taste of brandy. 

Q. Now matter how it tastes ; is the man who, under any circumstances, 
or in any form, drinks half a glass of brandy — do you mean to say that 
in all cases that is a sin ? 



424 APPENDIX. 

A. I never said that it was a sin in any case. 

Q. What is your opinion of the immorality of the thing ? 

A. I gave my opinion as to the immorality of selling it as a beverage for 
money ; that is, I gave my opinion about it, and I gave no opinion about the 
individual cases. It is the sale of the thing, so far as it goes, that is certain to 
bring ruin upon the community. It is the right of every woman and child in 
this Commonwealth that the traffic in liquor should be prohibited. They are 
entirely helpless if we do not protect them by the law. 

Q. Is it not, in your opinion, wisdom to adopt such legislation as will 
restrain and prevent this evil to the greatest extent ? 

A, It is. 

Q. If the present prohibitory law does not have that effect, would you not 
try something else ? 

A. I would, but I would give it a fair trial. It is perfectly patent that 
this law has not had a fair trial. 

Q. If you, then, were satisfied that this law had not had the effect, and 
would not have the effect to restrain or lessen intemperance, would you not 
think it a matter of expediency to try something else ? 

A . As at present advised, I do not think so. 

Q. Assuming as a fact that this law has not and does not promise to have 
that effect, and that everybody sees that it does not, would you not prefer to 
try something else ? 

A. That is an hypothesis. I hope you will excuse me from answering 
hypotheses. I would let the Committee take the responsibility. If they 
report a law, let them take the responsibility. We are all in the same com- 
munity. We are no better than other people ; but it is a matter of history 
that ruin comes to the community that uses spirituous liquor. For myself, I 
think that if those gentlemen who have been up here and said that the law 
could not be enforced had only said that it could be enforced, it would be 
enforced. It was said that it was of no use to try to suppress the rebellion. 
But our Governor did not say so. When the rebellion broke out the 
language of the people was, " Rebellion, it shall be crushed ; the Union, it 
shall be preserved." Just take the same ground in this law, and it will go, 
and these people will hide their heads who say that it cannot be enforced. 

Q. Is it your opinion that wine ought not to be sold to be used for the 
communion table ? Is wine bought for use at the communion table in the 
Old South Church ? 

A. There comes the casuistry again. Of course there are many exceptions 
in regard to the sale of wine. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What you mean to say here, if I understand you, 
is, that when these purposes are provided for by the law which men of expe- 
rience and science have determined to be proper, namely : uses for medicine 
and use in the arts so far as may be necessary, the further traffic in liquor to 
use it as a beverage in the community, is, from every point of view, to be 
condemned ? 

A . I think it is an immorality in the sight of God and in the sight of man, 
without any laws by the State. 



APPENDIX. 425 

Q. And that anything which, regarded as a practice, swells these social 
evils, partakes itself of the character of the evil ? 

A. Well, sir, there is casuistry again. I cannot go into that question, and 
I won't. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you remember that the license law ever did 
anything to restrain the traffic ? 

A. I think that sometimes there has been a spasmodic influence under a 
new mayor, or something of that kind, but never anything effectual. 

54 



426 APPENDIX. 



THIRTEENTH DAY. 

Wednesday, March 13, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the introduction of testimony 
on behalf of the remonstrants was resumed. 

Testimony of Ezra Farnsworth. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are a resident of Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do business in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Where is your business location ? 

A. Winthrop Square. 

Q. What business are you in ? 

A. Dry goods and commission business. 

Q. Manufactured goods, &c. ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is your opinion as to a prohibitory law, as compared with a 
license law ? Which is preferable in your judgment ? 

A. I should say a prohibitory law, sir. 

Q. Have you any reasons to give ? 

A . Well, sir ; I should say that, especially now, in the present state of 
things, while the law is on the statute-book, we had better make a fair trial, 
and see whether we can execute it before we give it up. As I understand it, 
there is no great difficulty in executing the law in the country, nor in any 
place outside the larger cities and towns. I am not sure that it cannot be 
executed in those places. It may not have been executed entirely thus far, 
but I think it can. 

Q. From what you see, do you think there has been any general effort to 
execute it ? 

A. My impression would be that there had not been any strenuous efforts 
made. 

Q. You are familiar- with the merchants in the dry goods trade in your 
region ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What seems to be the general sentiment among them ? About how 
are they divided between the prohibitory law and the license law ? 

A. My impression would be, so far as I have heard anything said in 
expression of opinion, that a large majority were in favor of a prohibitory 
law. 

Q. And that is the sentiment of the merchants in Franklin Street and in 
that region ? 

A. So far as I have any means of knowing. 



APPENDIX. 427 

Q. Do you know whether there have been any efforts in that region in the 
way of petitioning the Legislature in regard to this subject ? 

A. I have heard of a petition. I do not know anything about it personally. 

Q. You are a member of what is called the orthodox congregational 
denomination in this city ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is the general sentiment of that denomination, ministers and 
people, so far as you know ? 

A. So far as I know, I should say that the general and almost universal 
sentiment was in favor of the prohibitory law. 

Q. Have you any general ideas upon this subject which you would like to 
give ? If so, please give them. 

A. Well, sir ; my own impression is that it would be a step most decidedly 
backwards, to back down, as I will call it, from the law at present in exist- 
ence, and to adopt a license system. I am a decided friend of temperance, 
and a decided opponent of intemperance. I do not suppose that the drinking 
of a glass of wine or a glass of liquor, necessarily, would hurt me or you, but 
I do suppose that drunkenness begins with temperate drinking, and I suppose 
that I should take it on the ground that I have always taken, that, although 
it might not injure me, still it does injure others ; and I should act on the 
principle laid down by the Apostle Paul, — " If meat makes my brother to 
offend, I will eat no meat so long as the world stands." I feel called upon to 
discountenance the use of liquor, and to use all the influence I can to prevent 
the drinking of it. I am not by any means certain that this law cannot be 
executed in Boston. I do not think we have had a fair trial of it yet. 

Q. Do you not think that the results of the proceedings of the State 
Constabulary indicate very strongly that it can be enforced ? 

A. Yes, sir; I should say that the experiment was working well so far, 
and I think we had better give it a thorough test. 

Q. You are in the habit of conversing with members of your church and 
others of your faith, and I suppose you understand their sentiments pretty 
well? 

A. I understand the sentiments pretty well of our church, and I think I do 
pretty generally in the other churches. 

Q. The plan proposed here to give to the municipal authorities in the 
cities and to the town authorities liberty to license at their discretion, as I 
understand it. Do you think it would be fair to give Boston liberty to license, 
for instance, according to that plan, giving licenses to grocers, apotheca- 
ries, hotel-keepers and victuallers, and the surrounding cities should be opposed 
to license — do you think it would be fair to these cities to hold this temptation 
to the young and inexperienced in them, to tempt them in here. 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Or to deluge them with jugs and bottles from Boston, when they, of 
their own accord, would prohibit the sale ? 

A. No, sir. I should be opposed to that. 

Q. A great inequality and a great injustice you would regard it ? 

A. I should. 



428 APPENDIX. 

Q. And it would also be unjust and unfair if Boston should prohibit the sale, 
and Charlestown should license the sale, and thus tempt people over there to 
drink ? 

A. Yes, sir. I have heard the remark made frequently recently, that 
intemperance had increased within the last few years ; and it has frequently 
occurred to me that one occasion for that, if such is the fact so far as we are 
concerned here in Boston, is that in the great portion of this State liquor is 
not easily obtained, and, therefore, if men must drink and will drink they will 
come here and purchase it. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) What is your opinion with regard to the fact 
whether it has increased or not ? 

A. Well, sir, I have had an impression for the last two or three years 
(though perhaps not within the last six months), that there is more intem- 
perance than there was in years past ; and I have accounted for it partly from 
this fact, that people come from the country where they cannot easily obtain 
liquor, and " let out " as they say here. 

Q. Do you not think that men of hard drinking habits have fled from the 
country into the city, because they could more easily gratify their appetites 
here ? 

A. I do not know that I could say that from observation, as I do not come 
in contact with them, but I have had a general impression that there was 
more liquor drank here because it could not be easily obtained in the country. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) The ground of your favoring any law is with refer- 
ence to what shall be most efficient in checking the use of liquor and promoting 
temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. If it were a fact that the prohibitory law in the state of things that 
exists now was less favorable to temperanee than some other kind of a law, 
you would then be in favor of some other law, would you not ? 

A. Yes, sir ; if that could be thoroughly proved to be the fact. 

Q. The question, then, in your mind is, whether this law or any other law 
that might be framed would be most efficient in promoting temperance; that 
is the whole question, is it not, as it lies in your mind ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I would inquire whether, in the last few years, say going back for ten 
or fifteen years, and so up to within the last six months, you have any facts 
or information as to the increase of drinking usages in the higher circles of 
society over what it used to be. Is the use more general among those classes 
now than formerly ? 

A. It would be rather my impression that it was, sir. 

Q. Do you not know that this custom has become somewhat extensive, 
and that these usages have increased to an alarming extent among young 
men? 

A. If there is an increase, it is certainly alarming, and it is certainly my 
opinion that there has been an increase. 

Q. In regard to the execution of this law, should you regard it as an execu- 
tion that would have any benefit upon the cause of temperance, to shut up one 
of these open establishments and to have four or five or six put up in its place 



APPENDIX. 429 

where there should be as much sold secretly as there had been openly ? 
Would that be a beneficial execution of the law, if that were the fact ? 

A . I should not consider that an execution of the law at all. 

Q. Your idea of the execution of the law, is merely from the reports that 
you see in the papers as to how many of these places are closed ; and you 
think it is now being executed ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. If it goes no further than to shut up one place, and to have an increase 
in the sale, it would not be any execution of the law that was of any value ? 

A. Perhaps not. I should say that that was not an execution of the law. 

Q. But I understand that you desire such legislation as will most effec- 
tually promote temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I take that ground. 

Q. You are not wedded to any particular form of law, whether it be a 
prohibitory law or anything else ? 

A. No, sir ; I am not wedded to an particular form. 

Q. I would ask your opinion on this point : Do you think that any mere 
law, without the aid of moral means, will effectually suppress intemperance ? 

A. No, sir. I should say that I believe in moral means as the strongest 
and best means for promoting temperance ; but at the same time, I should 
add, that I should believe in having the law as an adjunct and assistant. 

Q. But you think that moral means would effect more in connection with 
the law than the law would accomplish without moral means ? 

A. I do not know as I can make a distinction, sir. 

Q. Is there any tendency in your opinion that the punishment of an evil 
works a moral reform in the minds of men ? 

A. I do not know exactly what you mean by that question. 

Q. You do not expect a man could be converted by Act of Parliament ? 

A. No, sir ; if you mean a moral change. 

Q. I mean a moral change in the habit of drinking liquors. Do you 
suppose that the law has any tendency to produce this moral change ? 

A. I believe that the law frequently leads to this result, from the fact that 
they cannot get the liquor ; and they lose the habit and the taste. I have no 
doubt that many have been reformed because they could not get liquor. 

Q. Has there been any time when they could not get it in Boston ? 

A. My own judgment would be that there have been a great many places 
where the law has subjected men to so much difficulty in getting it, that a 
man would go without it. 

Q. That depends upon the strength of the appetite, does it not ? 

A. I do not know anything about the strength of the appetite. Fortu- 
nately, I never had this appetite, and only know of it from observation. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I want to know if you would suppose there 
could be such a state of things as that the licensing of the sale could suppress 
it and the prohibition enhance it ? 

A. I do not, sir. 

Q. The gentleman asks, whether it is any advantage to shut up one shop 
and have half a dozen others spring up in secret places in consequence ? I 



430 APPENDIX. 

want to know if that is common sense, that the support of a law against any 
evil is going to increase it ? 

A. I should not think it was. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I understood you that you would not call the shut- 
ting up of one place where liquors are sold, and having two or three other 
places spring up in its stead, an enforcement of the law ? 

A. No, sir ; I would not call that an enforcement of the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) You are acquainted with the fact, of course, that a 
very large portion of the community are in the habit of using more or less of 
wines and liquors as beverages ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And also that a large quantity of such articles are in the State and 
probably always will be in the State ? 

A., I do not say that it always will be ; I hope it will not. 

Q. Taking the state of things as it is, do you think there would be a ten- 
dency for parties to get the liquor, no matter what law existed ? 

A . Certain parties might ; but I should go back of that. I should say 
that the whole community were not in favor of drinking, either theoretically 
or practically ; and I expect the time will come when there will be a very 
small part of the community that will either drink or favor drinking. 

Q. Taking the present state of things, how is it ? 

A. As things stand to-day, I should not say that a large part of the 
community, even here in Boston, drink. 

Q. Do you think that a majority of the community in Boston act on the 
principle of total abstinence ? 

A. As a matter of fact, I should say that probably a majority do not 
drink. I do not say whether they do not do it from mere principle, or what 
the motive is. I am aware that in certain classes wine is drank ; but when 
you come to the masses of the people, or when you come into our congre- 
gation, for instance, I do not think that you will find one in ten that drinks at 
all. 

Q. Do you not suppose that the larger proportion of persons would find 
means of getting liquor, the state of things being as they are now, there 
existing a taste for liquor in the community, and the liquor itself being here ? 

A. I do not know, sir, as to the liquor being here as a supposition. 

Q. That is something which you cannot prevent, can you ? You cannot 
prevent the liquor from being imported, can you ? 

A . Congress might make a law. 

Q. Not as the law stands to-day, you cannot prevent it, can you ? 

A . As the law stands to-day it can be imported. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Have you in your observation, had any means of 
judging whether the Germans, as a population, were more addicted to 
intemperance than the Irish ? 

A. I presume they are less addicted to it, as far as my observation extends, 

Q. I want to ask whether or not, the Germans, being a beer-drinking class 
of society, are not, on the whole, less addicted to intemperance than the 
Irish who are more in the habit of drinking distilled liquors ? 



APPENDIX. 431 

A. I have not really very much means of knowing. I do not come in con- 
tact with the Germans as much as with the Irish. My general impression 
would be that there was more intemperance among the Irish. 

Q. I would ask, whether or not, if some plan could be adopted whereby 
the drinking and sale of malt liquors should be made free, you would not 
arrive at the same state of things among the Irish as among the Germans ? 

A. I should say in reply to that, that my observation abroad would not 
favor that idea. I was abroad a few years ago and spent a good deal of time 
in Manchester and other towns where they drank a good deal of beer, and I 
think it is as immoral and as injurious a kind of drinking as there can be. 

Testimony of Rev. N. E. Cobleigh. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Will you be kind enough to give your residence 
and occupation, and the denomination to which you belong ? 

A. I reside in Boston ; am editor of " Zion's Herald," and belong to the 
Methodist denomination. 

Q. Have you given any special thought to the various measures for the 
suppression of intemperance ? 

A. I have, sir. 

Q. For how long a period ? 

A. Fifteen or twenty years. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state in your own way what opinions you 
entertain and the reasons therefor ? 

A. I reached the conclusion many years ago that the only way of sup- 
pressing intemperance was by prohibitory laws, based on the principle not 
simply of greater efficiency, but on the ground of the prohibition of the evil. 
As I consider both the sale and use of liquors as a beverage to be an evil, I 
think that the evil should be prohibited and not regulated by license. 

Q. Is there anything in your experience during the years that we have 
had a prohibitory law on our statute books, that would shake your confidence ? 

A. Not at all. The law has not as yet had a fair opportunity. It has 
been embarrassed in the courts, and it has been embarrassed in the jury box, 
and in a variety of ways ; and when that embarrassment is removed, I see no 
difficulty in removing it as well as other evils. 

Q. What has been your opinion as to the measures taken in Boston for 
the suppression of the sale ? 

A. I have understood from the public testimony of some of the officials 
who have been present here, that they had not tried to enforce the law in 
Boston ; assuming that they did desire to have it enforced. 

Q. Do you consider it a fact that they did not desire to have it enforced ? 

A. I have not heard any expression in regard to that matter as to whether 
they desired to enforce it or not. 

Q. What is your opinion of a license law such as has been proposed here, 
or of any license law ? t 

A. Well, sir, I understand that the license system for the last two hundred 
years has never been enforced in anyplace effectually, and that they have 
very much the same difficulties in procuring convictions under the license 
laws as under the prohibitory law. I have heard legal gentlemen so state 



432 APPENDIX. 

who have been connected with courts for a score or more of years. They 
have said that the same difficulty will attend the enforcement of the license 
system as has attended the prohibitory system. 

Q. Have you reason to believe that there is more perjury and false testi- 
mony on the part of witnesses and jurors now than under the existence of the 
license laws ? 

A. I have no knowledge of the matter of perjury under either. My 
business has, of course, led me out of the courts, and I know nothing except a 
general impression gathered up from observation. 

Q. Do you see any reason from general observation why men should per- 
jure themselves under the prohibitory law any more than they would under a 
license law, provided that the license law were made to operate as a restraint ? 

A. I suppose that the reason why persons are led to perjure themselves is 
that they desire to secure some interest to themselves ; but I do not suppose 
that the prohibitory law or license law would change the interest that they 
would have on the subject. 

Q. Have you observed the operation of the law in other cities than 
Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you look upon the subject as so changed in its character by the 
different circumstances of the towns or cities as to require a different 
administration and a different system of measures ? 

A. No essential difference in the main principle. There might be some 
little difference in the details. 

Q. What are the general opinions of your church upon this subject ? 

A . Well, sir, so far as I know, they are almost entirely on one side, and 
that is in favor of the prohibitory system. 

Q. What would be the fact if a clergyman in your church were known to 
be what we commonly call a temperate drinker ? 

A. I doubt whether he would remain in the church very long. 

Q. Your churches universally would reject such a man ? 

A. Our church is in theory, and I judge most universally in practice, in 
favor of total abstinence. 

Q. Have you anything in your church articles that demands that ? 

A. We have in our rules. 

Q. In your discipline, you mean ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You require your members, as well as your clergymen, to be abstainers ? 

A. We have had a general rule to that effect. 

Q. The theory of your church government assumes, that the use of liquors 
habitually is good ground for discipline ? 

A. That is the public opinion so far as I am acquainted with the church. 
I have known of some cases where individuals have been supposed to use 
ardent spirits occasionally, and they have been generally waited upon by 
committees, and the thing has been "rought to an issue. 

Q. There was a gentleman who testified the other day, who ranks in your 
denomination in regular standing. I refer to Mr. Jones ? 

A. I do not know such a gentleman, sir. 



APPENDIX. 433 

Q. What is your opinion with regard to the practical working of a license 
system that should give extended license to the sale of liquors? What would 
be the influence upon the peace and order and morality of the community ? 

A. My idea of impartiality would lead me to decide against any such 
system. What would be applicable to one should be applicable to all. 

Q. Do you think that the people in the laboring cities could have a fair 
discrimination ? 

A. I think it would be impossible in laboring cities. 

Q. Do you think it possible as regards the rights of persons ? 

A . So far as a license should restrain, it would interfere with the rights of 
persons, the same as under the prohibitory law. 

Q. And if it is made, what the gentlemen talk about here, a stringent 
license law — that is, if it had any effect at all in restraining the traffic and use 
of liquor — would it involve the same principles ? 

* A. So far as it restrained, it would involve all the objections and all the 
difficulties. 

Q. Do you have any difficulty in the Bible as to maintaining the views 
you have here expressed ? 

A. I think that I derive my conviction on the subject from the Bible. 

Q. You do not think that you are commanded by any divine authority to 
perpetuate the drinking habits and usages of society ? 

A. I do not think there is any justification offered in Scripture, when it is 
properly interpreted, to favor the use of intoxicating liquors. Wherever 
there is the seeming favoring of it, it is in reference to an article that was not 
intoxicating. 

Q. That is well understood by commentators ? 

A. Yes, sir, I think it is ; not only in the Scriptures, but history comes 
in to confirm it. 

Q. What do you regard as true temperance in the use of intoxicating 
liquors as beverages ? 

A. I regard, in the first place, that the use of intoxicating liquors as a 
beverage, is an evil and that continually ; and that the only ground on Scrip- 
tuf e doctrine, in regard to that, is that of total abstinence and perpetual 
abstinence. 

Q. From what point do you set out in that respect ? Do you believe that 
the use of alcoholic beverages, simply as beverages, are disturbers in the 
physical economy of a person in health ? 

A . I understand that alcohol is a principle that can never be used in the 
human system for any purpose whatever but as a disturber. I understand that 
the highest scientific judgment in> Europe, within the last twenty years, has 
decided the question that alcohol, in no case, is ever assimilated in the system. 

Q. And so you regard all self-treatment which is injurious to one's self, 
intellectually, physically and morally, as so far wrong and even sinful ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. What would you say, looking at the matter in a social point of view, 
even though an individual might use it with impunity ? 

A. I should take another view on that subject, that, even though it is 
possible for certain individuals to use it, yet, under their Christian duties, they 
55 



434 APPENDIX. 

should abstain, inasmuch as we are exhorted by the apostle to abstain from 
all appearance of evil. 

Q. How is it as to the use of alcohol ? 

A. I think that it creates a morbid appetite which has a tendency to 
increase constantly. 

Q. Do you believe that a Christian man, aware of that fact, can lend his 
influence innocently in the use of intoxicating liquors simply as beverages ? 

A. If you were to ask the question whether I could, as a Christian man, I 
would answer in the negative at once. I should not feel at liberty to judge 
for all others. 

Q. Should you feel that there was any principle involved in your opinion, 
from the -class of theological questions which you might have in your family, 
that would not also apply to your opinions as a clergyman ? 

A. I consider that the principle applies the same in either case ? 

Q. Have you resided in the West ? 

A. I have, sir. 

Q. For what term of years ? 

A. Ten years. 

Q. What was your observation there as to the state of temperance as 
compared with New England •? 

A. Well, sir, there is a very little difference, except, perhaps, in the 
nature of the beverage that they drink. They drink more bad whiskey there 
than we do here. 

Q. Have you ever seen any contrast between the States where the traffic 
was licensed and where it was prohibited, which seemed to make against 
prohibition ? 

A. In reference to the different States, I do not know that I ever had any 
special observation, but when I was in the State of Illinois, the law that was 
in operation in the State at that time was, that the towns should have liberty 
to say whether they would or would not license the sale of ardent spirits, and 
many of the towns would not license at all, but enforced in reality the pro- 
hibitory law or the principle of prohibition. I think that is the state of 
things in Illinois at the present time in many of the towns. 

Q. Was that law so executed as to suppress the traffic ? 

A. That law was so executed that nobody could obtain any liquor openly. 

Q. How did these towns compare with those where licenses were 
granted ? 

A. They compared favorably, in that respectable people preferred these 
towns to reside in ; and it had the effect to draw certain classes of inhabitants 
and a certain class of business, while it excluded and sent to other towns an 
element that was not desirable. The price of real estate was generally 
higher. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Higher where ? 

A. Where the prohibitory principle was enforced. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) In the towns where licenses were granted, were 
there or were there not other persons selling without license ? 

A. Nearly everybody sold in those towns where there was no prohibition ; 
whether they were licensed or not, I do not know. 



APPENDIX. 435 

Q. What would be the relative difficulty of executing the license law, 
whatever might be its condition, in towns where the sale of liquor was not 
prohibited by the refusal of the license ? 

A. If a majority of the people in the State preferred prohibition, outright, 
I think they would have no more difficulty in executing that than they would 
on the other principle. I think there would be less complication because it 
would be a general principle everywhere. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) In these towns in Illinois where the licenses were 
not allowed by the authorities, how did the state of temperance compare with 
the state of temperance in our towns where the law is enforced ? 

A. I have but little knowledge of the condition of things in our towns 
here. The temperance movement was very active in the State of Elinois at 
the time I was there. 

Q. In the towns where there were no licenses allowed, was there substan- 
tial intemperance ? 

AT' Yes, sir ; and it was on account of the principle of temperance that 
they prohibited the sale. 

Q. If I understand you, the sale might be licensed at the option of the 
town? 

A . That was the condition of things several years ago. 

Q. And in these towns was there substantial temperance? Might you 
not reasonably have such a state of things in Massachusetts ? 

A. We might, unless there was some place like the city of Boston, where 
an over-mastering influence swept through the country to prevent. There 
was no such concentration of capital there as there is here. 

Q. A license system might be engrafted upon this law, leaving it optional 
with towns to permit or not permit the sale, might it not, if we had not such 
an over-bearing influence as there is in Boston, and if we had the same state 
of things in the country as there is now ? 

A. I should not select such a state of things as they had in Illinois at that 
time. 

Q. Then you would have it arranged so that nobody should have it in those 
towns where licensing was prohibited ? 

A. Yes, sir, as a beverage. I should hope there would nobody have it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooler.) Do you think it would be well in the city, where 
the large majority of the population were foreigners, to throw the machine, 
under such an arrangement, into the hands of foreigners ? 

A. I should think that was far from desirable. 

Q. Do you think it is fair to hazard the results in one town where the sale 
of liquor is not licensed, by having other towns around it that do have 
licenses ? 

A. . I just now said that I should not select such a state of things. I take 
the broader principle of prohibition throughout. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Most of the questions put to you are questions 
concerning dietetics and concerning science. Am I to understand that you 
regard yourself as an expert in dietetics ? 

Q. (By Mr. Cobleigh.) I would like to have you explain what you 
mean by the term expert. 



436 APPENDIX. 

A. (By Mr. Andrew.) A person who by reason of peculiar studies has 
fitted himself so as to be able to give a better opinion upon any subject than 
other people who have not ; for instance, a doctor of medicine is regarded 
as a person well fitted to express opinions on medical questions ; an engineer 
upon questions of bridge-building, road-making, etc. Now, upon the question 
of dietetics or natural science, do you consider yourself an expert ? 

A. I have not a chemical knowledge sufficient to explain the operation 
of alcohol upon the human system ; but I have read the writings of some of 
the most eminent physiologists, and have reached my opinions from that 
source. 

Q. Therefore you do not hold yourself out as an expert, any further than 
any other well-read gentleman may do ? 

A. I do not make any special pretension upon any of those things. 

Q. You have given various opinions upon moral questions and religious 
questions. You spoke from your point of view as a minister of the Methodist 
denomination, did you not ? 

A. I did. 

Q. Is there an article in the creed of your denomination in reference to 
this subject of the use of liquor ? 

A. There is no article in the creed. There is a rule among what we call 
general rules, prohibiting the use as a beverage of intoxicating liquor. 

Q. Do you recollect the phraseology of that rule ? 

A. I do not, sir. 

Q. By whom was it made ? 

A. By Wesley. 

Q. So that there has been no new rule since the days of John Wesley ? 

A. There has been no new rule. The language may have been modified, 
but I am not certain. 

Q. To what extent is that rule of Wesley made binding ? 

A. That rule goes to this extent : that the person who is entitled to mem- 
bership in the society must abstain from certain things and from doing certain 
things ; and this is one of those from which he is to abstain ; and the opinion 
upon that point in this country has been almost universal, so far as I know. 

Q. Confine yourself to the rule and the execution of the rule. 

A. The rule would be executed very much according to circumstances. 
It is not an iron rule that executes itself. 

Q. Is it not true that a member of the Methodist Church must keep the 
commandments of God as they are declared to men in what we call revealed 
religion ? 

A. I should think he ought to do it. 

Q. Does not the discipline require it ? 

A. The discipline does require it, as it does in all other churches. 

Q. If a man should break one of the ten commandments, that would be a 
ground for disciplinary action by the church, would it not ? 

A. It would, if it could be found out to be true. 

Q. Has the church added any new commandments to those positively 
written in the Bible ? 

A . I have not heard of any. 



APPENDIX. 437 

Q. Is it recognizod byanything in the discipline of the church, as a breach 
of the commandments of the church as revealed in the Bible, that a person 
should moderately and temperately drink spirits and wine ? 

A. If they use them as medicines, there is not. 

Q. Suppose a question should arise between one brother of a church and 
another as to whether that other, in drinking or giving a glass of wine, drank 
as medicine, or by prescription, or as a beverage, thinking it would do him 
good — is that a question of which your church would take recognition, and 
is the person who does this liable to be disciplined and expelled from the 
church ? 

A. As I said before, that depends altogether upon the state of the church. 
If they choose to proceed they may do so. 

Q. I am supposing that the church does right, and obeys the law of its 
own constitution ? 

A. I do not understand your question. 

Q. My question is this simply : Does the law of the Methodist Church 
expose a brother to discipline and expulsion from the church for drinking a 
glass of distilled liquor or wine, unless it was apparent that he did it by 
prescription of a physician ? 

A. If he drank but a single glass we should bear with him for a while. 

Q. What does the law of the church say ? 

A. The law of the church does not specify all these things, except in 
general, if they are found to do anything which would exclude them from the 
kingdom of grace and of glory. 

Q. Is that sufficient to exclude a man from the kingdom of grace and of 
glory ? 

A. You do not expect me to decide that. I suppose that the church 
leaves that very much for the common sense of the people to determine. If 
the committee thought so, they would be in duty bound to expel him. 

Q. You can imagine a case where a man ought not to be excluded who 
would not be excluded from the kingdom of grace and glory ? 

A. Certainly ; I can imagine such a case. 

Q. Then there is no binding rule, is there ? 

A. There is no specific rule to that effect. There is a rule, however, 
sufficiently specific ; so that if certain facts are brought out specifically, those 
sitting upon the matter could discipline him. 

Q. Then it is a matter of good judgment on the part of the committee 
who try the case ? 

A. It necessarily must be on those points not specifically determined. 

Q. The fact, then, is like the fact that a blow sufficient to cause death is a 
cause for murder ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. The discipline of the church being such as it is, are you prepared to 
advise that the government of this world should be more positive and more 
exact in their legislation ? 

A. I do not understand your question. 

Q. Then I would not trouble you to answer it. We have thus far been 
considering the discipline of the church. The thing that the Committee have 



438 APPENDIX. 

under consideration is the discipline of the State and not of the church ; and 
the great question which addresses itself to the consideration of the Committee 
is, What shall be done by this Legislature in the exercise of its law-making 
power, for the government of the people of this world, in the matters of this 
world. Now, that being so, I would like to call your attention to the answer 
made in the beginning of your examination, in which you expressed the 
opinion that the sale and use of alcoholic liquors, as beverages, is an evil, and 
is therefore to be prohibited as not legal ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Now when you uttered that word, did you mean that the sale of liquors 
as a beverage, and that their use as a beverage, should be prohibited ? 

A. I should put the two in one proposition and blend them together. 

Q. That is to say, you regard the sale of liquors to be an evil, as a 
beverage, or otherwise ? 

A. No, sir ; I mean simply as a beverage. 

Q. And the use as a beverage ? 

A. And the use as a beverage. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state what you mean by beverage ? 

A . Drinking for any other than medicinal purposes. 

Q. Within what range will you confine medicinal purposes ? 

A. Prescriptions of a physician. 

Q. Then you think no person ought to be allowed to drink anything that 
contains alcohol except by the prescription of a physician ? 

A. I should think nothing more than in other business. 

Q. That is a comparative and not a positive answer. Do you think the 
law ought to forbid any person to drink any liquor into which alcohol has 
entered as a constituent, unless by a prescription of a physician ? 

A. I think if we cut off the tree at the roots it will die, and we shall not 
have to cut off the branches : and if we prohibit the sale we should not have 
to prohibit the use. The use is the moral side and the sale is the civil side : 
hence I think the Legislature may legislate on the sale and traffic, while the 
pulpit had better legislate upon the use as a beverage. 

Q. Then you would confine yourself to the prohibitory law ? 

A. I think I would confine. myself to the prohibition of the illegal traffic. 

Q. Simply ? 

A. Simply. 

Q. Do you think the vendor is competent to hold the vendee responsible 
for the use which he makes of the liquor which is sold to him ? 

A. If the sale is according to law he would not be. 

Q. But do you suppose that the law is competent to do so ? Can the law 
make the vendor responsible for what the vendee shall do after he has got 
the article ? 

A. I do not see any relative point to the question. 

Q. The law authorizes the sale of wine for sacramental purposes by 
every body ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Therefore you or I may set up an establishment for the sale of sacra- 
mental wine ? 



APPENDIX. 439 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The law authorizes the agents of the towns to sell for certain specific 
purposes. Now, supposing any person comes to you or me with a false pre- 
tense, and we sell a gallon of wine. Should we be responsible for the misuse 
thereafterwards made, if it was misused ? 

A . If I am allowed to answer my question by a supposition, I should do it 
in this way : that I would not have any alcoholic wines used for the sacra- 
ment. I am not sufficiently versed in the science of legislation to give a very 
expert answer to that question. 

Q. But then you have given different answers to various questions, and 
answered them very intelligently. Now I ask you the question, if the sale oi 
liquor is immoral, and the law permits you or me to make a sale, are we respon- 
sible for the abuse, or the misuse, or the use of the article after the sale ? 

A. I should think that question would depend a great deal upon the 
circumstances under which the sale was made. 

Q. Then if you do not think proper to answer the question directly, we 
will go back to the other branch of the inquiry. You recognize, it seems, 
certain legitimate and rightful uses of these things, which must sometimes be 
drank ; you recognize the fact that there is an appetite and desire to use 
these things for purposes which you do not regard as directly medicinal, do 
you not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How large is that, do you suppose ; taking society as its exists, what 
proportion of mankind now living in Massachusetts, at some time of their 
lives, find occasion for their use ? 

Q. (By Mr. Cobleigh.) Medicinal use ? 

A. (By Mr. Andrew.) Not necessarily medicinal. 

A. I have no means of determining. I have formed no opinion on that 
question. 

Q. Have you any idea of the quantity of distilled spirits now annually 
produced in this country ? 

A. I have only an indefinite idea that it is very large. 

Q. Can you not come any nearer than that ? 

A. No, sir, not now. 

Q. Have you any idea of the production of fermented liquor in this 
country ? 

A. I have not the figures. I have an idea that there is a large quantity 
produced. 

Q. Are you aware that ninety-three millions of fermented liquors are 
produced in the country annually ? 

A. I have the figures and have filed them away ; but I have not got them 
m mind now. 

Q. Are you aware that if one-half of the amount annually produced in 
this country were drank, it would make about a gallon and a half for every 
man and woman in this country? That would testify to a very large 
demand, would it not ? 
A. Yes, sir, it would. 



440 APPENDIX. 

Q. When you consider this very large demand, which is, a portion of it, 
a legitimate demand, although a portion of it is as you consider an improper 
demand ; and when you consider the vast amount of property (for the law 
makes it so when it is thus invested), and the great bulk of material which is 
seeking a purchaser, would you think that, if you were sitting here as a legis- 
tor, it would be physically possible, or morally possible to prevent the 
producer and the consumer, with the articles in hand, in some way or other 
from finding each other ? 

A. I think it would be possible to prevent the legitimate transfer. 

Q. Do you think it would be possible to prevent the actual transfer ? 

A . It might not prevent it entirely ; probably it would not. 

Q. Then you do not think that it is practically possible to prevent and 
prohibit people from making, people from selling, people from buying and 
people from drinking these things ? 

A. Well, sir, it is not possible to prevent murder and licentiousness, and 
those other crimes, and of course we cannot prevent this entirely. 

Q. Do you think that you can very largely abridge it by prohibition ? 

A. Yes, sir, I think we can. 

Q. Have you ever known it to be done on earth, by any government on 
earth ? 

A. I have known it to be to some extent. 

Q. You have known it to be apparently and openly ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you ever known it to be done successfully, so that people are not 
obliged to resort to places where liquor is not sold openly ? 

A. Yes, sir; but virtue is not responsible for all the vice that is done in 
the dark. I would act in this just as I do in regard to gambling and licensing 
houses of ill-fame. The rule would apply in both cases exactly alike. You 
cannot entirely prohibit them, and I think the same principle underlies 
them all. 

Q. Do you think that laws are made for the punishment of sin ? Are 
they not made for the peace and order and decorum of society ? 

A. Yes, sir; and so I consider a law of this kind. 

Q. Do you regard a law which prohibits the sale of liquors entirely as 
more conducive to the peace, order, and decorum of society ? 

A. And prosperity. These things include prosperity. 

Q. Are you not introducing a very large word when you say the "pros- 
perity ? " 

A. Yes, sir, a very large word. I think they probably have that idea in 
their legislation upon that question. 

Q. Do you think that that law affords a basis of legislative action ? 

A. When it is combined with as palpable evils as are connected with the 
use of ardent spirits. 

Q. Do you think that it would even come to that ? Is it not your opinion 
that it would be better if everybody believed in the doctrines and discipline 
of the Methodist Church ? 

A. No, sir, I do not think it would. 

Q. Do you not advocate that ? 



APPENDIX. 441 

A. I do not think there would be but little variety. I think it is necessary 
to have some people getting one side of the truth and the others some other, 
inasmuch as we cannot get the whole of it. 

Q. Which Conference do you belong to V 

A. The New England Conference. 

Q. Is it not true that every minister belonging to the Conference is con 
sidered annually by the Conference ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that a gentleman belonging to the Conference, who has not been 
disciplined in any way, is therefore in good and regular standing ? 

A. His character is brought up for consideration, and if nothing is brought 
up against him, he is considered in good and regular standing. Every minis- 
ter's name is called, and it is asked if there is anything against him. 

Q. I understand you to say that during the past fifteen years the law ha? 
not been enforced in Boston ? 

A. It has not been enforced to any great extent until quite recently. 

Q. What do you call enforcing the law ? 

A. Bringing it down upon the individual that is guilty. 

Q. Do you regard enforcing the law, by executing it upon individual men, 
without success in accomplishing the end of the law, anything more than a 
formal execution ? 

A. The same execution that we have in any case where the law prescribes 
a penalty upon the guilty. I consider it enforced so far. 

Q. Do you suppose that the Legislature makes laws for the fun of it, in 
order to see how many men it can bring within its meshes and punish ? 

A. I should hope not, sir. 

Q. So far, then, those laws which are substantially and really executed 
are the laws that prevent the most of those who are evilly disposed from doing 
wrong, and actually punishes those who do in fact disobey ? 

A . I suppose that is the design of the law. 

Q. Now, supposing that you have a law of such a character that, in a 
community of from one hundred and fifty to two hundred thousand people, 
where they have annual elections of the municipal officers and magistrates, 
these officers and magistrates themselves annually chosen for fifteen consecu- 
tive years to enforce the law, declare that there are obstacles in the way, and 
that they are not able by any force to put down the traffic among a certain 
class of people, do you regard such a law as that as one which it is desirable 
to execute by the exhibition of physical force ? 

A. I should not consider the law as enforced, certainly. 

Q. Should you think that there was anything hopeful in such a law consis- 
tent with the manners of the whole community on the one hand, and the 
liberties of a free people on the other ? 

A. If you apply that to the prohibitory law of this city, I should think 
that now, since the decisions of the courts have been made, the law will 
be enforced. 

Q. Do you think that the law will change the opinion of the people ? 

A. I think it has changed. 
56 



442 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have they not been changed so far heretofore as to desire a different 
law? 

A. I suppose that from the simple fact that the rebellion was on our hands 
that they turned to that, and now, that the rebellion is done, they seem to 
take up the law, and I judge that the design is to put it through. 

Q. How do you judge of that in the years in which there was a rebellion ? 

A. The difficulty lies in the fact, that there was an embarrassment in the 
courts which has since been corrected. 

Q. In all? 

A. Not in all, but in some. 

Q. Take these parts of the law that are not affected by the objections to 
which you allude, what do you say ? 

A. In the first place, it takes some little while to get things in a working 
condition to carry out the law. 

Q. What is necessary ? 

A. I have not examined the question. I suppose there is some little to be 
done to make it perfectly proper and right. 

Q. How was it for several years in which they were tinkering the law ? 

A. It is not yet right. There have been some laws which have been 
vetoed. I think that now there is a fair prospect of enforcing the law in the 
city of Boston. You must have a law carried, out so as to prevent the 
consumption and sale of liquor. 

Q. Without the aid of further legislation ? 

A. Without the aid of any further legislation than I hope we shall get this 
year, sir. 

Q. You mean this, then, that if you can get just such laws as you would 
have passed, with force enough you can execute it here in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. I think you can execute it. I think that Boston can execute 
any law that is right. 

Q. Do you call that the fulfilment of the law, when, over the heads of the 
people, and against the convictions of the people, you are executing a few 
men, and succeed in punishing or controlling by physical force a few men ? 

A. I think the law is executed just so far as it is applied in that case. I 
should not want to make any comparison between this and the fugitive slave 
law, because I consider that as wrong and this as right. 

Q. But others consider that right ? 

A. Not many in Massachusetts. 

Q. Then how do you make certain distinction between the execution of 
the law in the individual instance upon individual men, by physical force, and 
the fulfilment of the law by society ? 

A. I do not know that I understand your meaning of the fulfilment of the 
law. If you mean the object for which law was made, then I can conceive a 
distinction, and I see the same difficulties in other laws which have been on 
the statute book for many years, and that while they were made to suppress 
certain evils, they only partially do it. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I would like to inquire whether it is a custom in 
your church to locate ministers, without giving them any trial whatever, and 
locating them for reasons that impair their usefulness, or supposed to impair 



APPENDIX. 443 

their usefulness, and yet upon which they "are not supposed to be brought to 
trial ? 

A. It is our custom, under some circumstances, to locate clergymen with- 
out request on their part. 

Q. Do you mean to say that public opinion in Boston has been changed in 
regard to this matter ? 

A. I include the whole State. 

Q. What would you say in regard to Boston ? 

A. I should think the opinion had not varied much. 

Q. Should you think that the change, if any, was in favor of the law ? 

A. I think perhaps the simple fact that the law has not been executed to 
any great extent, may have produced some uneasiness and a desire to have 
something that could be executed. 

Q. Do you not know of many men, whom you know to be conscientiously 
as earnest as you were, in their opinions, whose opinions have changed in the 
last few years, in regard to the feasibility of this law ? 

A. I know of some that pretend to be in favor of temperance, and desire 
a license law, but whether they formerly favored prohibition or not, I do not 
know. 

Q. Do you know of any person who formerly favored prohibition that is 
now against it ? 

A. I have not any person in my mind now. 

Q. Do you think there has been any change, in any part of the State, on 
the part of persons originally opposed to the law, who are now in favor of it? 

A. When I speak of change of opinion, I mean that there is an enforce- 
ment to the cause of temperance and in favor of the present system, from the 
youth, who are growing up to maturity. I think that there is a growing 
opinion in favor of the law, and that four or five years more would bring a 
very large reinforcement to the cause. I think that there is hope. 

Q. Do you regard any use or sale of distilled liquor, except on the pre- 
scription of a physician, as a sin ? . 

A. I cannot imagine how you can take ardent spirits on any ground where 
you can say that it is for the glory of God to take them. 

Q. That refers to the reasons that lead you to your opinions. Do you 
regard the drinking of any distilled or fermented liquors, except on the pre- 
scription of a physician, as a sin ? 

A. Well, sir, I cannot say but that there may be circumstances under 
which a person may be justified on a general principle. 

Q. You mean in emergencies ? 

A. I should have to fall back on that question, and say that I should have 
to judge for myself, as I could not judge for others. 

Q. Do you regard it as a sin to use distilled or fermented liquors in cook- 
ing, as in pies, or in jellies ? 4 

A. That is a new question. Whatever is used in the kitchen for cooking 
purposes is changed, as I suppose, and the alcoholic principle destroyed 
before it gets upon the table. 

Q. Then you do not regard it as a sin to use these articles in cooking ? 



444 APPENDIX. 

A. I should not regard it as a - sin if the intoxicating principle, were 
destroyed before they were used. 

Q. Take the case of jellies. Do you regard it as a sin to use wine in 
jelly? 

A. That is a question that I have not considered ; it is a very important 
question. 

Q. What would be your impression ? 

A. I should want to do as the judge does, take time to consider it. 

Q. Do you know that it is very commonly used ? 

A. I do not know it. 

Q. Has it not come to your knowledge that farmers have been accustomed 
to use cider from time immemorial in cooking ? 

A. Yes, sir ; some of them in times past have used it, I suppose. 

Q. Do you not suppose that there are a good many farmers who now use 
cider in cooking ? 

A. I presume there may be. 

Q. Do you regard that use as sinful ? 

A. I stated just now that, if the principle of intoxication is destroyed 
before it is used, the use of it might be justified. 

Q. Assuming that the principle of intoxication has been destroyed, then 
you do not regard it as sinful to use it ? 

A. I do not think that it would be a very clear case that it was sinful. 

Q. You are quite certain that it would not be, are you. not ? 

A. I am certain that it would depend upon certain circumstances, and 
how a man viewed it. 

Q. Would you avoid it ? 

A. I could tell better when the individual case was brought up. 

Q. I do not think you meet the question. We are assuming that certain 
articles are used in certain cases. Do I understand you that it would be sin- 
ful to use these articles in these cases ? 

A. That would depend upon circumstances. If the intoxicating principle 
was destroyed, it would not be sinful. 

Q. Now if it is not sinful, those persons have a right to use the article for 
cooking purposes, have they not ? 

Q. (By Mr. Cobleigh.) Do you mean legal or moral right ? 

A. (By Mr. Andrew.) Moral right. 

A. I suppose they have, sir ; that is, if they do not consider it to be sinful. 

Q. Taking the case of cider and wine, and taking the fact as proved that 
the cooking has destroyed the intoxicating principles ; then taking the further 
fact, as I understood you to say, that that use is not sinful ; and then taking 
the further fact that the person has a moral right to use these articles, have 
the persons a right to go and purchase them ? 

A. Not if they cannot get them without violation of the law. There may 
be other circumstances of a very grave character that would prevent them. 

Q. Do you not think that they have as much right to go and purchase 
these articles as persons have who use them for medicinal and mechanical 
purposes ? 



APPENDIX. 445 

A. I think .it is entirely unnecessary, and that they might forego the use 
of them. 

Q. I understand you that there is nothing morally wrong about it ? 

A . Do not understand me to say that it is not morally wrong. I do not 
say that it is wrong under a certain supposition. 

Q. When a man is obliged to go to a physician to see if he is to get it for 
a certain purpose, that is sufficient that it is to be regarded as proper, is it ? 

A . I understand that a prescription is regarded as proper. 

Q. Now suppose it is made perfectly clear to the town agent that these 
articles are to be used in cooking, where the intoxicating principle is removed, 
why not permit the agent to sell to a man for this purpose ? 

A. I should think it would be very unwise to make such a provision, if a 
great evil is likely to arise from it. 

Q. Why is there any evil now, then ? In every case it is a question 
whether the application is honest or not. 

A. Because the greater the number of exceptions, the greater the liability 
to evil. 

Q. Then your ground is that you have got to stop somewhere, and that 
it might be as well here as anywhere ? You do not consider that there is any 
more wrong in using these elements in cooking than for mechanical purposes, 
do you ? 

A . Yes, sir ; because a wrong might grow out of the tendency. It is the 
same principle upon which Paul would have restrained from eating meat. If 
a man sees that the use of a thing leads another person to it, he is under 
obligation to cease. 

Testimony of T. R. Dennison. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Your residence is in New Bedford ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is your occupation ? 

A. I am a city missionary. 

Q. A lay missionary ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you labored in that capacity ? 

A. I have labored fourteen years in New Bedford in that capacity. 

Q. Will you state the present condition of the temperance cause in New 
Bedford, and also the condition of the poor, as they come under your obser- 
vation ? 

A. I think that the temperance cause in New Bedford is in a better con- 
dition than it has been before during the last twenty years. 

Q. Do you mean that there is less drinking and selling ? 

A. I witness less of the effects of intemperance. 

Q. Have you seen any favorable effect upon the poor of the city ? 

A. Yes, sir. During the last fourteen years I think that there are not 
many families in New Bedford who have come to want because of tins liquor 
traffic who have not come under my notice in some way. A great many also 
consult me in regard to cases that come to them, and thus I learn the condi- 
tion of pretty nearly all the families. 



446 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you seen anything that leads you to desire the repeal of the pro- 
hibitory liquor law, or the engrafting (as it is called), of a license law upon 
it? 

A. I do not think that I have. On the other hand, I think that we are 
getting along now very well indeed. I think that the liquor traffic in New 
Bedford has very much lessened, and that drunkenness in our streets has 
decreased greatly. I was recently looking at the police reports of 1863. In 
that year there were 338 ; in 1864, 250 ; 1865, 183, and last year, 149,— a 
falling off of 189. We are now doing more by moral suasion than we have 
ever before done, because we consider the law aiding us ; and both working 
together, we consider it very favorable to the cause. 

Q. So that the general activity of the temperance friends is increasing ? 

A . It was never greater than at the present time. We have more temper- 
ance organizations now than ever before. A few years since we had no 
organizations of the kind. I used to be applied to by mothers and by fami- 
lies who were suffering because of drunkenness, to know if something could 
not be done to stop the traffic in liquor. 

Q. Speaking of the American population, especially in New Bedford, how, 
in your judgment, does the present use of intoxicating liquors by that popula- 
tion compare with the use in former years ? 

A. It has fallen off. Very few of the American population are addicted 
to drinking. 

Q. How do the present efforts to execute the law succeed ? 

A . I do not now know of any open places of sale. I know that a great many 
places have closed up during the past year. I do not see any of any account, 
and I have inquired the condition, in that respect, of the different neighbor- 
hoods where I have not gone around, and they say there has been a great 
change within the last year. 

Q. And you have not felt that this closing of open places has increased the 
traffic ? 

A. No, sir ; I have not. I am told that a great many who have been in the 
habit of drinking cannot get it now. 

Q. Do you perceive any beneficial effects in the greater comfort of the 
poor? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is it marked ? 

A. Last winter I had the fewest calls from the poor of any year since I 
have been in the mission business. 

Q. During how many years ? 

A. Fourteen. A large number have signed the pledge who had formerly 
been in the habit of drinking. The organization of the Sons of Temperance 
there includes both male and female, and numbers one thousand members. 
We have four different orders, which take in a great many who have been 
in the habit of drinking. 

Q. Have you noticed any change in regard to the amount of crime in that 
city? 

A. Of course I regard intemperance as the source of a great deal of other 
crime, — such as houses of ill-fame. 



APPENDIX. 447 

Q. Has it been a matter of general repute in New Bedford, that houses of 
ill-fame were generally connected with the liquor traffic ? 

A. It is generally said so. There are now very few houses of ill-fame in 
New Bedford, that I know of, as compared with what there was a few years 
ago. 

Testimony of Hon. Robert C. Pitman. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Will you be kind enough to state to the Committee 
your residence, the official relations you have held to the City Government, 
and what you know concerning the courts of your county ? 

A. I have lived in New Bedford all my days. My profession is that of 
attorney at law, which I have practised eighteen years. I have been in 
both branches of the Legislature, and held the Police Court in New Bedford 
from June, 1858, until January, 1864. As to the temperance reformation, I 
have taken an interest in it from my earliest recollection. 

Q. Have you been in the habit of giving much thought to temperance and 
temperance matters ? 

A. I should say that temperance and anti-slavery, outside of my profession, 
have pretty well divided my thoughts. 

Q. Have your views upon the subject of temperance theoretically been in 
harmony with the doctrine of total abstinence, or with the doctrine of mod- 
erate use ? 

A. I was brought up to think that the only safe course was entire absti- 
nence from intoxicating liquor as a beverage. 

Q. Will you, in your own way, state your views in general upon the 
question here at issue, with special reference to prohibition and licenses ? 

A. If the course had not already been pursued, I should have great objec- 
tion to injecting an argument into the testimony. In my own county, there 
has not been a license system from the earliest dawn of my recollection. The 
people of the county took that matter into their own hands, and the County 
Commissioners granted no licenses. The struggle was before I came upon the 
stage. I have investigated the history of license laws and the result of 
attempts to enforce them, and I have formed a very strong opinion that it is 
impossible to regulate the sale of intoxicating drinks. I think it is a demon- 
strated fact that the sale of ardent spirits cannot be checked by license laws. 
I agree with the statement made by Mr. Child in 1838, when we had gone 
through the experience of a license law, that it " had no appreciable effect in 
checking the liquor traffic." In regard to the prohibitory law, I fully recognize 
the great difficulty of its enforcement, and that it demands an expression on the 
part of the people that they wish it enforced. I fully agree that, if the majority 
of the people do not want it enforced, that it never can be enforced ; that in a 
Republican Government the only way we ascertain the will of the people is 
by legislation. I think we have a right to assume that the people are in favor 
of this law, and to call upon the people for its enforcement. In our own city, 
we have had many contests to obtain possession of the municipal force for the 
purpose of enforcing the law. Those contests have never been successful ; 
sometimes we ran pretty closely, and sometimes were beaten pretty badly. I 
have reason to believe that the liquor traffic has constituted a nucleus 



448 APPENDIX. 

of men, who had a direct interest in the business. The opposition has been 
confined to clergymen, reformers, and those who have not had the material 
wherewith to effect political action. It has been with this, as it was with 
the anti-slavery battle, the mass of the people have been too indifferent, and 
not having their minds made up fully in favor of the proposition, have refused 
to decide in favor of the actual enforcement of the law. The mass of the 
people generally side with the existing state of things. I am, however, fully 
convinced that the prohibitory law can be so far enforced in our city as to 
check, and almost entirely prohibit, the open sale of intoxicating liquors. 

Q. Do you recognize any very marked distinction between this law and 
other criminal laws in that respect ? 

A. This law has greater opposition, because it attacks a power entrenched 
partly behind capital, and partly behind passion. I do not think that there is 
any intrinsic impossibility of enforcing the law. 

Q. You speak now, particularly, of your own city and the neighboring 
community ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is the open traffic in your county materially interfered with at the 
present time ? 

A. From what I hear from reliable sources* I should say that it is inter- 
fered with and checked to an extent that it has not been in any previous time 
within my recollection. Whether that interference continues, will depend 
upon the action of the courts and of the district-attorneys. My impression is 
that the reason it has not been more generally enforced heretofore, has been 
owing to the leniency of the courts, and the inaction of the district-attor- 
neys. I have known convictions in my own court, which, if followed 
up by sentence, would have greatly aided in the suppression of the traffic. 
If respectable dealers, when convicted, had been sentenced, that class of 
dealers would have been almost annihilated. Even when there were very few 
convictions in my own court, there were a great many disclosing cases ; and 
even when parties were convicted, and an appeal made to the upper court 
and the action affirmed, the cases were put on file by the payment of costs. 

Q. And without sentence ? 

A. Without sentence. I have now in my mind a case where, if the party 
had been sentenced, it would have materially changed the character of the 
liquor-traffic. 

Q. Has the difficulty thus arising from the infidelity of the officers of the 
court been removed, or does it still remain, in your county ? 

A. Answering your question somewhat generally, I may say that, even 
supposing, as I do, that the majority of the people of the State are somewhat 
passively in favor of the law, a more active demonstration of their feeling 
upon the question is necessary to procure a right action by the district-attor- 
neys and by the courts. Every year that I live, I see that those in official 
stations are but men, and are influenced by active demonstrations of public 
opinion ; and my own impression is that, before we can have the law rightly 
enforced, we must have the verdict of the people more definitely expressed in 
regard to it. 



APPENDIX. 449 

Q. You have observed, I suppose, the labors of the authorities in other 
counties to enforce the law. As a member of the Legislature, you had your 
attention called to the difficulty of executing the law in Suffolk County ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What has been your observation in that respect ? 

A . This is a matter of such general information, the difficulty is so generally 
conceded, that I cannot state it better than in the language of the Hon. Mr. 
Parker, in his report on the license law, in 1865, when he said that the diffi- 
culty in Suffolk County was that " the jurors blocked the execution of the 
law." 

Q. Have you any information in regard to the manner those juries are 
selected ? 

- A. We had very full information given us by the Aldermen of Boston 
upon that subject. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state the facts in respect to that matter ? 

A. It appeared that the jury list was practically made up in Boston j that 
the Board of Aldermen and Common Councilmen of the different wards 
selected from the voting list the persons to compose the jury ; that the list 
was then handed to the city clerk, made up and acted upon by the City 
Council, and generally was acted on as received. In a case that has become 
of somewhat historical importance, two or three hundred names were added, 
upon the motion of a member of the Common Council. It also appeared 
that there was always one or two liquor-dealers as members of the Common 
Council, who were very likely to select the names of some persons who 
were liquor-dealers for the jury list. It is a matter of fact, that there were 
generally more or less liquor-dealers upon the jury list. 

Q. Did it appear that the number of dissenting jurors, where the evidence 
was such as ought to secure conviction, bore any relation to the number of 
liquor-dealers upon the jury ? 

A. In some cases the number of liquor-dealers upon the jury was the 
precise number of dissenters. I would not wish to be understood as saying 
that such was always the case. It was stated by one witness that sometimes 
persons who took their " toddy " were also among the dissenters. The result 
of the examination was sufficient to satisfy my mind that the removal of that 
obstacle would go a great way towards the removing of the difficulty in 
securing convictions. 

Q. Were any efforts made for the removal of that obstacle ? 

A. Yes, sir ; it is a matter of history, that by successive legislation bills 
have been passed with that object in view. 

Q. Have you any general impression how large, relatively, have been the 
votes for and against attempts to remedy that evil ? 

A. The majorities were generally pretty large; not sufficient, however, to 
overcome the veto. 

Q. In relation to a license law that is not prohibitory, do you see any 
decrease of difficulty in executing such a law ? Would you deem it easier to 
execute a law against the unlicensed, or against the licensed for a violation of 
the condition of their license, than it is to execute the present prohibitory 
law? 

57 



450 APPENDIX. 

A. That question divides itself into two or more parts. As a lawyer, I 
should say that for ease of execution, for thoroughness, for ease in drawing 
indictments and complaints, and for evidence, no law could be better than 
the one that we now have upon our statute books. The moment you create 
exceptions, conditions and classifications, you raise a new group of questions 
and complicate its operation. So far as regards convictions, I am hardly as 
good a judge as are gentlemen who live in counties where there is a difficulty 
in obtaining convictions. I have refreshed my memory by a reference to the 
notes taken in the hearing upon this subject in 1864. It was then stated by 
Mr. Brewster that " it would depend upon what the license was placed at, 
and what kind of people were licensed, whether there would be ease of con- 
viction or not." 

Q. What did you understand him to mean by that ? 

A. That he would not put the license fee so high, but that any decent, 
respectable man could pay it. Mr. Kurtz stated that he would place the 
license fee at three hundred dollars, and license a thousand persons, by which 
he would have a revenue of three hundred thousand dollars. Mr. Brewster 
thought that if so large a fee was exacted there would be a difficulty in 
getting convictions. He said that the chief difficulty in getting convictions in 
Boston was the fact, that the police selected the poor and friendless, and let 
the others go, and that indisposed the jurors to convict. It is, of course, a 
matter of doubt whether juries would or would not be ready to convict under 
a license law. Mr. Brewster also said that if there was a vigorous enforce- 
ment of the license law in Boston, it would result in a political revolution, 
and eject from office the parties enforcing it. In other words, if you had a 
loose license law, it would amount to nothing, and if you had a strict one, it 
would not continue to be enforced. 

Q. Do you think that a license law which should attempt to interfere with 
the love of gain, or considerably interfere with the love of gain upon the part 
of the traffickers, and grant no indulgence upon the part of the drinkers, 
would meet with any less objection than the present law ? 

A. I think there would be quite as much objection as now, and it would 
be intensified by the odium of monopoly. I think that the great difficulty in 
enforcing a license law would be, that the moral principle, or the momentum 
that comes from a belief in a thing, would be lacking. In Massachusetts, the 
great power, after all, is moral power. The temperance men, of all grades, 
would not care for the enforcement of the license law ; it would be left for the 
people engaged in the business, and they would do very little for it. 

Q. Is it in your judgment manifest that a license law that should authorize 
the hotel-keepers, the apothecaries, the grocers and the victuallers of Boston 
to sell intoxicating beverages, and protect them, of course, in the sale, could 
: in any sense be called stringent, or could in any degree restrict the evils 
flowing from intemperance ? 

A. So far as regards hotel-keepers, I consider that they are the most dan- 
gerous class to license. I remember a remark made to me by a strong oppo- 
nent of the prohibitory law, that he thought that more evil was done at 
Parker's than at any other place in Boston, and he did not see why the State 
Constabulary should not immediately close up his bar. 



APPENDIX. 451 

Q. As a nuisance ? 

A. Yes, sir. My opinion is, that to offer facilities to the young to drink at 
hotels, when they are not under the eye of the public, is a most dangerous 
practice, and that hotels are a great source of temptation to young men from 
the country. I think that any attempt to confine the liquor traffic to any 
particular class of persons, would be utterly futile. It has been tried, and we 
can speak from experience. The ingenuity of men in every country and 
state, has been expended upon license laws, for the last two hundred years. 

Q. And everywhere failed to restrain the unlicensed ? 

A. Yes, sir; that is the universal testimony. There is now in Rhode 
Island a new bill, for a new kind of license law. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Have they had a prohibitory law ? 

A. They had a prohibitory law, and then they had a license law for two or 
three years upon the statute book, and now they are about to repeal that and 
make another license law. I do not think that a prohibitory law does any 
good unless it is enforced. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you consider that any demoralizing effect 
would flow from the enactment of a license law that should assume the use of 
alcoholic beverages, as requisite to the public good ? 

A. I think that it would tend in that direction. If we assume the use of 
alcoholic beverages to be a public good, we ought lfot to restrict the sale. 

Q. What would be the result of such a law upon the respectability of the 
traffic, and the use of liquors as beverages ? 

A. I think that it would increase the respectability and the use. I think 
that at present, the use of intoxicating liquors, though not considered dis- 
reputable is not considered respectable. I think it would not, in any sense 
of the word, be countenanced as a moral or religious thing. 

Q. What would be the natural effect of rendering it legally respectable 
upon the amount that would be used ? 

A. I think that it would tend to increase the amount, and that to so 
marked an extent, as to spread its use among a class of society from which it 
is now mainly excluded from principle. 

Q. Do you perceive any very deleterious influences from the fact of the 
violation of the existing law, simply as a violation of a law ? 

A. I think that the violation of any law is very injurious in its effects. I 
I have always thought it to be a matter demanding the very earnest attention 
of the temperance people, and my influence has been exerted more for the 
enforcement of the present law, than in preventing the enactment of a license 
law. I have said that I preferred to see a license law enacted than to see the 
present law continue to be trodden under foot. 

Q. But do you see any reason for the repeal of this law that would not 
apply with equal force for the repealing of the law against gambling or 
against houses of ill fame ? 

A. I would have the enforcement of the law aimed at, and persistently 
tried for. Whenever I became convinced that it was impossible, to any 
reasonable extent, to enforce the law, I would repeal it and let the traffic go 
unregulated ; I would not license it. But my impression is very strong that 
" to a Yankee mind, an obstacle, is simply a difficulty to be overcome." 



452 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you believe in the ability of the State to suppress the liquor traffic ? 

A. I do. I should be ashamed of my State if I thought that the liquor- 
dealers were stronger than the Commonwealth. 

Q. If it were urged that the sale of liquor would thereby become more 
secret, and the use as a beverage more general, would it be anything different 
than what you would expect from wicked men in all ages ? 

A. That is a different thing. A secret trade, carried on in that way, is 
not a reproach upon the sovereignity of the State. 

Q. It is sometimes thought that the present prohibitory law is a violation 
of the natural right of man to sell and drink liquor. What are your views 
upon that question, as compared with the right to tax people to repair the 
damages of the liquor traffic ? 

A . It seems to me perfectly clear that it is in the power of society to dry 
up the causes of crime. Dr. Channing, years ago, said that society ought to 
aim chiefly at the prevention of crime, and although he was an extreme advo- 
cate of the rights of individuals, he considered it the duty of society to shield 
itself from the effects of vice. Dr. Wayland treats the subject under the 
head of justice to character, and considers that it is an absolute wrong for a 
person to allow another to tempt him by the sale of liquor or opium. He 
regarded it as a matter of justice to the individual that he should be 
protected. • 

Q. What hopes do you entertain under such a license law as is proposed, 
that the cities in which the foreign population chiefly reside, would be able to 
withhold licenses and prevent the sale of liquor ? 

A. I presume that licenses would be granted in large cities. Licenses 
would be granted at first, but whether permanently anybody would care to 
take out a license, I should somewhat doubt. 

Q. Do you think that it would be possible for the American population in 
cities, where the foreign population chiefly reside, to deliver themselves 
from the burdens of taxation, to repair the damages of intemperance ? 

A. No, sir; I doubt whether they would be able to. 

Q. Suppose the neighboring towns around Boston should vote " no 
license," and Boston and Charlestown should vote to license, would those 
smaller towns be able to protect themselves from the evils of intemperance ? 

A. I suppose that so long as we are in Massachusetts we must all live 
and die together. I think that any policy should be pretty nearly uniform in 
its application throughout the State. 

Q. Do you see any objection to lodging a discriminating power in the 
matter of the sale of liquors, with the people of the several towns ? 

A. I think that it would not effect the object desired, to prohibit the sale 
of liquors in one town and allow it in the next. 

Q. You made an allusion to a member of the council inserting a large 
number of names in the jury list in an informal way ? 

A. No, sir, not in an informal way ; it was by a vote. It is perfectly 
competent for any person to add any number of names in the manner in 
which that was done. I do not wish to be understood as saying that there was 
anything improper about it. 



APPENDIX. 453 

Q. Did you understand anything about the character of the parties whose 
namci were thus added ? 

A. That inquiry was not gone into. It was, however, stated by the pros- 
ecuting attorney, that at one time there were twelve or thirteen jurors from 
the neighborhood of Fort Hill, and that he had great difficulty in getting votes 
upon the nuisance cases. 

Q. The cases brought before the courts then were nuisance cases ? 

A. Yes, sir ; chiefly. 

Q. Had the Nuisance Act, as it then stood, as much power and efficiency 
as the prohibitory law ? 

A . It has been said that the " Nuisance Act was the back-door out of 
which offenders escaped the punishment that originally appended to their 
crimes." The Nuisance Act provided for the punishment of offenders by fine, 
but not by imprisonment. It was used as a police regulation. When a place 
where liquor was sold was disorderly, or was kept open at unseasonable hours, 
it was complained of just as any other disorderly house would be complained 
of. 

I ought to add one word in regard to statistics in the matter of intem- 
perance. I think that on both sides there is great danger of being misled 
by statistics. They should be very carefully sifted to be of any value. The 
police of any town have it in their power to vary the statistics of drunkenness 
very greatly, by putting in or leaving out the " lodgers," and in many other 
Ways. If you were to shut up half the drinking-houses in Boston, you would 
not greatly diminish intemperance, while you left the other half open ; but 
if you were to shut up all the sources of temptation for a few years, you would 
find a great change wrought. I suppose, however, if there is any liquor any- 
where to be found, that the old toper will have it. The great object, I 
think, is to remove all sources of temptation from the young, and thus help 
those who desire it to reform. 

Q. Would you include among the means by which the stasistics of drunk- 
enness in cities could be greatly varied, the different degrees of inebriety in 
which men might be arrested ? 

A. Yes, sir. It was the custom in our city, and I think it is very gen- 
erally the custom, to take a great many persons and keep them over night, 
and release them in the morning. The custom varied at different times, under 
different officers, and sometimes according to the standing of the individual 
arrested. 

Q. On the whole, do you believe that the drinking usages of society have 
become more deplorable than formerly ? 

A. It is interesting to notice how the opinions of different persons vary in 
regard to matters of so general a character. I think men arc very likely to be 
misled in their judgment, by the circumstances in which they arc placed. 
For my part, I should hardly venture to give an opinion about it. 

Q. What would you naturally expect as the consequences of the great 
civil struggle through which we have just passed? 

A. The histories of all great wars and revolutions show a great increase of 
vice among the people affected by them, and especially of vices that take the 



454 APPENDIX. 

form of dissipation. I think it rather remarkable that there has not been a 
greater increase than at present appears. 

Q. You heard the testimony of the city missionary from your place ; does 
your observation confirm his statements ? 

A. My observation of drinking-places and drunken people has been very 
limited. My ways of life and place of living are removed from them ; and 
any information that I should give would be founded upon general report. I 
have no hesitation, however, in stating the fact that the open drinking-places 
are closed, and the police reports show a decrease of cases of drunkenness ; 
but whether such decrease be in consequence of the closing of the places of 
sale, or for some other cause, I cannot say. I do not look for any sudden and 
immediate change from the enforcement of this law. It seems to me that we 
are engaged in a long warfare, and that the battle is to be fought out upon 
this line. 

Q. You are of the opinion that it should be fought out upon this line ? 

A. Certainly. I look to the State to prohibit the sale of intoxicating 
liquors as a beverage. I think that the middle classes are with us in the 
effort 5 the rich and the low are, perhaps, against us. 

Q. Some stress is laid upon the declaration that there is a great deal of 
perjury committed under the operation of the present law ; have you noticed 
any particular difference in that respect between the existing and former 
laws? 

A. I suppose that such results might follow. He who drinks another 
man's liquor, would be very apt to testify in his favor, or at least no more 
against him than he could help. I would not repeal a law because people 
sometimes committed perjury under it ; if I did, I would repeal the law 
allowing defendants to testify. 

Q. When you find jurors and officials proving unfaithful under the exist- 
ing state of things, do you attribute that unfaithfulness to the prohibitory 
liquor law, or do you consider that the law only serves an opportunity for the 
development of their infidelity ? 

A . The apostle Paul said that if there had been no law, there would 
have been no sin. I will not say whether it is the cause, or the occasion. 

Q. Have you observed any such opposition to this law, or any such infi- 
delity on the part of the officers charged with its execution, as you would not 
have expected from the parties themselves, from their habits, opinions, and 
predelictions, taking human nature as it is ? 

A. That requires me to gauge my expectation of human virtue a little 
more than I have been accustomed to. The trouble is here : a man is con- 
victed ; the question is whether or not he shall receive the sentence that the 
law awards ; the temperance people are not going to seek out the prosecuting 
officer, and ask for a particular sentence, — there is something odious in so 
doing ; yet, on the other hand, the whole fraternity of drinkers and traffick- 
ers, with all the influence, political and otherwise that they can bring to bear, 
are seeking a favorable disposition of the case. I think the only way to 
secure the fidelity of the officers, is to let them know that then* tenure of 
office depends upon their fidelity. 



APPENDIX. 455 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You find the conduct of both judges and prose- 
cuting officers objectionable, and open to criticism under the law ? 

A. Not only under this law, but also under kindred laws. 
Q. Is there or is there not, any objection to be made as to the character 
and conduct of the jurors ? 

A. As a general thing there is not. There are exceptions, of course, but 
as a general thing, in Bristol County, the juries have found verdicts, where 
they reasonably ought. I want to say a word in regard to the District- Attor- 
neys. We have had four district-attorneys within a short time, and I do 
not intend my remarks to apply to the present incumbent, nor to any particular 
person. 

Q. Then the machinery has been pretty good but it has not been well 
worked ? 

A. That is, perhaps, a fair statement. 

Q. How far has the community itself worked with the machinery and 
against the courts and district-attorneys ? 

A. That is a point that I supposed I had previously stated. I will illus- 
trate by a case at the police court. A party was convicted. The temperance 
part of the community had a general desire to see the law executed, but they 
made no active exertion in the matter ; they did not see the district-attorney 
nor say anything about it. The influential liquor-dealers upon the other side, 
brought all their influence to bear upon him ; the lawyers and the politicians, 
who considered the liquor vote important, would lend their influence if it was 
necessary. They were understood to be a reserved force who could be had 
when wanted. 

Q. How have the community acted in the discharge of their political 
duties ? 

A. We have made the issue several times- and we have been beaten, 
because it was a moral principle against capital. We have been beaten several 
times. 

Q. And is that the attitude in which you now stand ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Beaten by the vote of the people in your own city of New Bedford ? 

A. Yes, sir ; not, however, acting really upon that question. It was 
always complicated with some other. 

Q. You had, then, not only to contend with the obstacles on the part of 
the magistrates, but you had also to contend with the difficulties that pertained 
to the open hostility of enemies, and the cold and unwilling, or hesitating 
support of friends ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Thus the magistracy and public opinion stand together ? 

A. Not exactly. I think that the magistracy would not enforce the law, 
even if these indifferent, hesitating people were to applaud it. I have read 
{n the papers, commendations of persons who enforced it,- and strictures upon 
those who did not enforce it. 

Q. Your experience during the last fifteen years, — your experience as a 
jurist and as a citizen, — your reading and reflection, have all led you to this 
conclusion, and the attitude in which you stand to-day is that of controversy ? 



456 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And you propose to " fight it out on this line " for years longer ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Therefore, as the matter now stands, it is simply a struggle for power ? 

A. It is a struggle to obtain the control of the State to such an extent as 
to control the personnel that execute the law. 

Q. In some respects, then, it is a doubtful struggle ? 

^4. I do not know ; I think that we have a faithful Chief Magistrate, who 
has instructed the State Constabulary to enforce the law. 

Q. But no member of a State government can alone maintain a law ? 

A. We have a Legislature that will help him; if we have not, we will try 
it again. 

Q. That brings back the question, while it remains a controversy, is it not 
in some sense at least, a doubtful one ? 

A. Not to my mind. I think the triumph of Truth is never doubtful. I 
think we are right. 

Q. And when you succeed, it will be a triumph of faith, I suppose ? 

A. And of works, also. 

Q. This, then, being the attitude in which we at present stand : one por- 
tion of the community arrayed in controversy in respect to the maintenance 
of a given machinery of legislation, against another portion of the community 
who are opposed to that machinery of legislation, and after fifteen years of 
controversy, it remains to-day a doubtful question on which side the majority 
of the people of Massachusetts are, you, nevertheless, as a jurist and a citizen, 
advise to keep up the fight ? 

A. I should if your premises were correct, but I do not allow your 
premises. There has not yet been fifteen years of struggle. 

Q. Then after fifteen years of the existence of the machinery, you still 
advise, as a jurist and a citizen, to keep up the fight? 

A. I do, because until within the past two years, the machinery had been 
rusting. 

Q. And you have no idea, I suppose, about how long you will keep it up ? 

A. I shall keep it up as long as a man ought to keep up a good fight in a 
good cause. We intend to take no steps backward. 

Q. Do you propose to use the machinery of the law for the purpose of 
procuring moral conviction in the minds of men? 

A. That is one great object. 

Q. And therefore you deliberately use the criminal processes of the Com- 
monwealth — the criminal law of the Commonwealth, and the bayonets of the 
Commonwealth, to produce moral conviction in the minds of men ? 

A. We propose to execute a law that we believe to be a right law. The 
law educates the people, and will create a public opinion that will sustain the 
law. 

Q. The controversy is between one portion of the people of Massachusetts 
and another portion of the people of Massachusetts, and it is as yet doubtful 
on which side is the majority ? 

A. It is doubtful whether the majority are ready to enforce the law, but I 
assume that a majority are in favor of the law. If the majority are opposed 



APPENDIX. 457 

to the law, I am not only willing that they should, but suppose that they will, 
repeal it. 

Q. Then, without any knowledge of which way the majority of the people 
are, in regard to the enforcement of the law, and after this experience of 
fifteen years, you still advise to keep up the controversy, and seek a vigorous 
enforcement of this legislation? 

A. I suppose that a majority of the people are in favor of the law. When 
it comes to the question whether or not a majority of the people are in favor 
of its vigorous enforcement, that is a question that admits of different degrees 
of answering, according to what you understand by a vigorous enforcement. 
I believe in keeping the law upon the statute book, because that it is the law 
of the people, and I believe in calling upon the people for help to enforce it. 

Q. You would hold the law over the people as a terror to evil-doers, but 
without being able to enforce the law ? 

A. It is pretty well enforced now ; if we can hold it at this point we will 
do a great deal. 

Q. You have criticized the conduct of the courts ; you have criticized the 
conduct of the district-attorneys ; you have criticized the conduct of the peo- 
ple of your own district, of your own part of the State ; you assume that 
those are the temperance people who are in favor of your law, and you pro- 
pose to stand by this particular piece of machinery, notwithstanding it is not 
sustained by the sentiment of the people, whether that sentiment be consid- 
ered as represented by the judiciary, by the prosecuting officers, by the public 
opinion of the great mass of the people, or by the fidelity of the temperance 
people. Is that your position ? 

A. I do propose to adhere to the machinery of the law ; that was your 
question, — the rest was all argument. I do not accept your statement of what 
I have said. 

Q. Do you say that you do not criticize the conduct of the courts ? 

A. I do criticize them. 

Q. Do you criticize the district-attorneys ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. Did you not say that a majority of the people of your own district 
have not stood up for the maintenance and enforcement of this law ? 

A. I did, sir. You just said that they were in sentiment opposed to it ; I 
do not agree to that. 

Q. And have you not said that the temperance people, ranking in favor of 
this law, have not stood by it with fidelity ? 

A. Yes, — using " temperance " in its full meaning. 

Q. And yet you advise to adhere to this machinery ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And to use the power of this machinery to enforce the obedience of 
the people ? 

A. I do, because this law has been more successful than any other that has 
been tried, and promises still greater success. 

Q. Are you not aware that the whole history of legislation, since about 
three hundred years ago, in England, shows an effort on the part of the law- 
making power to produce just such results as these, and without success ? 
58 



458 APPENDIX. 

A. By means of license laws or by prohibitory laws ? I am not aware of 
the enactment of any prohibitory law before the law of Maine. 

Q. Are you not aware of attempts at prohibition in other countries ? 

A . There may have been ; I am not aware of it. 

Q. Then you are not aware of the law of 1737, in England ? 

A. I am not. 

Q. Nor of the old legislation of Scotland ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) I should like to ask you whether or not, in the city 
of New Bedford, the city government has really excluded liquor-dealers from 
the list of jurors? 

A. I cannot tell you as to that. The question never has been raised. I 
can only say that, as a general thing, we have not had liquor-dealers upon the 
juries. 

Q. Is it your impression that any rule has ever been practically or for- 
mally adopted by the city government, excluding from the jury list the names 
of those who deal in liquor ? 

A. I think not. I think, however, that most of our aldermen would 
exclude liquor-dealers as improper persons ; but as we have had no real diffi- 
culty in getting convictions, no interest has been awakened in the question, 
and no issue has been raised. 

Q. You are of course familiar with the fact that when a jury is drawn, it 
is drawn for the hearing of all the cases that come before that term of the 
court ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And you also recognize the fact that a large part of those drawn as 
jurors, who might be objectionable on liquor cases because they were liquor- 
dealers, would be entirely suitable for the hearing of other cases ? 

A. I think not. I think that a man who habitually violates a law of the 
State, is not a good citizen, is not a sound man to act upon any question of 
criminal law. I think that the State owes it to itself to say that a class of 
men who openly violate the law as a trade, are not good citizens. 

Q. And therefore ought to be excluded from serving on all juries ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You stated, in answer to one of the inquiries, that it ought not to be 
assumed that the liquor-dealers were stronger than the Commonwealth. Do 
you consider that a statement of the entire ground ? Do you think that it is 
a contest between the liquor-dealers upon one side and the State upon the 
other ? 

A. I think that it may essentially be described in that way. 

Q. You use the term " liquor-dealers," I suppose, rather as a figurative 
expression, as describing the party opposing the license law ? 

A. It is a part put for the whole — a sort of figure of speech. 

Q. In reference to a question that Governor Andrew asked you, I suppose 
you agree to this : that there is a difference of opinion in regard to the ques- 
tion whether or not the majority of the people of the State actually support 
and believe in the present law. Would you be willing to leave the settlement 
of the question to the direct action of the people of the State ? Would you 



APPENDIX. 459 

be willing to leave the question of the passage of a license law to the people, 
and let a direct vote be taken upon it ? 

A. As a lawyer, I do not believe in that kind of legislation ; as a temper- 
ance man, I do not care how you bring the issue, if you bring it fairly before 
the people. As a lawyer, with my ideas of the distribution of power, I do 
not believe in the submission of legislative questions to a popular vote. 

Q. Do you not think that in this particular case it would be wise to submit 
this question to the people of the State, and let them vote directly upon it, 
and let them decide whether or not they will permit the form of a license law 
to be engrafted upon the present law ? 

A. I cannot waive my objection to that manner of legislation. If you 
mean to ask me if I should consider it any calamity if the question were to be 
thus submitted, I answer, no; but if I were a member of the Legislature I 
could not vote to thus submit it. 

Q. Do you not think that such a decision would go a great way towards 
settling the controversy that must exist as long as the matter remains as it is 
now ? 

A. I think not ; the same thing would be tried over and over again. 

Q. Suppose the question was submitted to the people, and they were to 
decide not to have a license law, it would, of course, prevent people from 
coming here and saying that the Legislature did not represent the people of 
the State ? 

A . It would be substituting another kind of government for that which 
we now live under. I think that it would be an unwise thing to say to the 
people that we submit to them whether this criminal law shall be repealed, 
and especially now when we are making renewed efforts to enforce it. 

Q. But when a very large portion of the people of the State claim that 
the law is allowed to remain upon the statute book simply because it is not 
enforced, is it not the best way to end the controversy to permit the people of 
the State to vote directly upon the question whether such a law shall remain 
or be repealed ? 

A. I do not believe that a majority of the people are in favor of a change. 

Q. Why are you not willing to waive your objection as a lawyer, for the 
sake of ending the controversy, and submit the question to the people ? 

A. Because we now have possession of the ground and have a right to 
regard the controversy as closed. 

Q. But it is not so regarded by the people of the State, otherwise we 
should not, every year, have these applications for a change ? 

A. I know of no better reflection of the will of the people than the acts 
of the Legislature. If we had a different kind of government, — a government 
in which all questions of legislation were submitted to the people, — then there 
would be nothing invidious about it. 

Q. Is there upon the statute book any other law in respect to which the 
opinions of good men are so equally divided ? 

A. I think that they are more divided in regard to the law forbidding per- 
sons to travel upon the Sabbath. 

Q. That law is not in force. 

A. But you asked about any law upon the statute book. 



460 APPENDIX. 

Q. Is that not one of the laws that is tolerated upon the statute book only 
because it is not enforced ? 

A. That involves another question of which I am in doubt: whether the 
people would vote to enforce it or not. I do not think tins law should be 
singled out from all other laws, and submitted to the people. This law 
has been upon the statute book for fifteen years, and I see no reason why it 
should now be submitted to the people. 

Q. You would then not be in favor of submitting to the people the ques- 
tion whether or not the license law should be engrafted upon this law ? 

A. I would not be, for the reasons that I have stated. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you think that there is any propriety in speak- 
ing of engrafting a license law upon the present law ? Does the principle 
of the proposed license law bear any analogy to the principle of the present 
prohibitory law ? 

A. I do not think that it does. One is based upon the ground that the 
use of intoxicating beverages is a public good ; the other that it is not. 

Q. Do you consider it possible that this controversy could be suppressed, 
except by the triumph of prohibition ? 

A . That is my view of it, as I have previously stated. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Is it your opinion that the practical operation of this 
law has been seriously interfered with from the beginning, by the numerous 
legal questions that have been carried to the higher courts ? 

A. The operation of the law from the beginning, has been embarrassed by 
the various decisions that have been given. After the law was passed, the 
people were timid about using it for some years ; then came the anti-slavery 
agitation which, for a time, occupied the attention of everybody ; then came 
the war ; and now I feel that the people are just beginning to address them- 
selves to the real struggle. 

Testimony of Oliver Ames. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) We would like your views upon the questions 
now before the Committee, in regard to the existing prohibitory law and the 
proposed license law ? 

A. I believe that I have been previously all through this matter of a license 
law. So far as my own experience in the matter goes, the prohibitory law in 
our town has been of very great service. We suffered very much more under 
the old license law than we have under the prohibitory law. We are now 
able almost entirely to keep out the sale of intoxicating drinks, although as we 
live so near Boston people are able to get liquor from here and to distribute it 
there to some extent. But that is but a small matter compared with the evil 
that was originally done. I believe that in Bristol County, since the "twenty- 
eight gallon law" was in force, the votes have been ten to one against licensing 
anybody to sell intoxicating liquors. I suppose that if the people of that 
county, at the present time, could vote upon this proposed change, there 
would be nearly as a great a majority as ten to one against the license law. 
We now have very little sold, no open sale, or drunkenness in our village ; 
but I can recollect very well under the old license law, when at least one-half 
of the people were drunkards. When our town had at least fifty per cent. 



APPENDIX. 461 

less population than it has to-day, our expenses for pauperism were very nearly 
double what they are at the present time. I have been a close observer of this 
matter in our town. I have been an active temperance man for forty years, 
and opposed to the license law. When the matter of licensing has been 
left to the County Commissioners, in almost every case we selected men for 
that office who were opposed to granting licenses. 

Q. Is the sentiment against the license law as strong now as formerly ? 
A. I think it is among the American population. Among the foreign 
population, of course, it is not quite so strong. Among the American popula- 
tion, I think the sentiment is just as strong to-day as it was twenty years ago. 
Q. Do you recollect enough of the operation of the old license laws as to 
state whether or not they served to restrain the traffic at all ? 

A. The old license law did not, for everybody had a license, and every- 
body sold who wished to. I know that in our own employment (and we 
employ a great number of men and have for many years), that under the old 
license system the work would be frequently almost broken up by the intem- 
perance of the men. Now we have no trouble of that kind. I do not see a 
drunken man about our place once in a year, if I do once in five years. The 
foreign population, I believe, occasionally find rum somewhere. 

Q. But they do not drink it constantly ? 

A. No, sir ; but they sometimes get it from Boston, where the law is not 
executed, and take it out in carpet bags, etc. 

Q. How are the habits of the people whom you employ as compared with 
what they were ten or fifteen years ago, in respect to intemperance ? 

A. The foreign element is very much larger than formerly ,*and they have 
no strong feeling towards temperance, but, as a general thing, are in favor of 
drinking. 

Q. Do you see any marked difference in the habits of the American 
portion of your men ? 

A. I think their habits are better than they were ten years ago. I do not 
know, however, as they are decidedly better. 

Q. They were very good then, I suppose ? 

A. Yes, sir. Very few of our American people are intemperate. 

Q. Would you not regard it as a great calamity to this State, if the Legis- 
lature should pass a license law, giving legal sanction to the traffic in 
intoxicating drinks as beverages? 

A. I would. I believe you could not inflict a greater curse upon the State 
of Massachusetts than to give free licenses. 

Q. If you have any other views you would like to express, please state 
them. 

A. I have nothing particular to say, except concerning my own experience 
in my own place. I do not know much about Boston, except that anybody 
that comes here to get liquor can get it. 

Q. How is it in your surrounding towns ? Are the people as intemperate 
as in Easton ? 

A. Very nearly the same. Perhaps the law is not enforced quite so well in 
some of our neighboring towns as it is in Easton. The law is universally 
enforced there. Of course we cannot stop every place from selling. There 



462 APPENDIX. 

are some places, I suppose, where people still sell, but it is pretty difficult to 
find it out. If they do sell it is clone in the night and in a clandestine 
manner. . 

Q. I suppose the open sale would not be tolerated a moment there ? 

A. No, sir ; I think it would not. 

Q. What is your idea of the doctrine broached here, that the more you 
suppress the sale the greater will be the sale ; that the more convictions you 
get and the more you drive it out of sight, the greater the sale ? 

A. I do not think that is a correct doctrine. I think that the more 
respectable you make the business the greater will be the sale. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) You are engaged in manufacturing agricultural 
implements at Easton ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of Ex-Lt. Gov. Eliphalet Trask. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You know the question before the Legislature. 
We would like to have your views upon it. 

A. I suppose that it is generally known (and if it is not I can state it), 
that I have always been in favor of the present prohibitory law ; and am still 
in favor of it. 

Q. Do you think it practicable to enforce it ? 

A. I do, sir. I think there is no difficulty in enforcing it if the authorities 
of the cities so decide. 

Q. Were you ever Mayor of Springfield ? 

A. I was in 1855. 

Q. You made some effort to enforce the law ? ' 

A. I did. 

Q. With what success? 

A. I call the success very good. The present law went into effect on the 
1st of July. If I recollect rightly there was a prohibitory law that was 
enacted in 1852 or 1853, authorizing cities and towns to appoint agencies for 
the sale of liquor. Then in 1855 there was an amendment to that law. I do 
not remember the time exactly, but I think that it took effect the 1st of July, 
1855. I instructed my police to enforce the law. I gave instructions to the 
City Marshal, and he carried them out the best that he could. The result 
was that in a very short time there were a few prosecutions, and the open sale 
was checked. There was not a hotel, or a saloon where the open sale was 
continued as it is continued to-day. The sale of liquor is not suppressed there 
now. Liquor was then to some extent brought into the town in the night- 
time, and undoubtedly there was a good deal of it used ; undoubtedly there 
were sales of liquor, but the open sale was then suppressed. There was not 
an open bar in the city. With one saloon we had some difficulty — the most 
respectable saloon in the city ; the party keeping it was prosecuted. He had 
been previously prosecuted, convicted and put under bonds for two thousand 
dollars to keep the peace. He was convicted under my administration and 
his property was attached. I did not remain in office long enough to finish 
up the suit, and it was withdrawn the next year, but his property was attached 
and he did not keep an open bar, as I was informed by the City Marshal. 



APPENDIX. 463 

Q. Although the open sale was suppressed, you say there was still a secret 
sale? 

A. Undoubtedly there was. I do not know of the fact, but undoubtedly 
there was a secret sale. We were troubled considerably by people bringing 
liquor to Thompsonville in Connecticut and leaving it there until the night- 
time, when they would bring it up in boats and wagons. I recollect that the 
City Marshal chased a man through the town one day, who had a lot of jugs 
underneath a load of cabbages which he got near Thompsonville ; but the 
Marshal did not succeed in overhauling him. Liquor was no doubt frequently 
brought in in that way. I do not think that there is any difficulty in 
enforcing the present law. 

Q. Have you had the Constables up there yet ? 

A. There are two in that county, located at Springfield, and they look 
after the matter somewhat — all that they are able to. The people there are 
satisfied with the working of the State Constabulary thus far ; but they can do 
very little where there is so much opposition. I spoke of the secret sale of 
liquor under my administration. It has been said that people will as much get 
liquor in a secret way as if it is sold openly. I do not think so, for this 
reason. We had a liquor agency before I was mayor. It had been in operation 
some two or three years. Under my administration I issued a proclamation 
on the 1st July, that they must take notice of the law and govern themselves 
accordingly. The liquor agency continued through the year to sell only in 
small quantities according to the law. I was informed at one time that the 
town agent had sold more than six gallons to one person, and I told him not 
to sell in such quantities again, but let the party go to Boston to the State 
Agent to obtain such a quantity. Only in that one case was there such an 
amount of liquor sold, and it was generally sold in very small quantities, 
usually upon prescriptions. The agent sold that year, according to his report to 
the State Treasurer, liquor amounting to $5,574.83 ; in 1856, $1,249.36 ; in 
1857, $82.37 ; in 1858, $26.31. In 1859 another mayor was chosen, and he 
endeavored to do what he could to enforce the law. There was received that 
year $205.38. In 1860, by some oversight, there was no report from the 
liquor agency made to the State Treasurer ; but the reports for 1860 and 1861 
were given, inclusive, and amounted to $244. The mayor endeavored to 
enforce the law, and the most of that $244 was undoubtedly under his admin- 
istration. In 1862 the amount is $54.67; in 1863, $43.35; in 1864, $39.56. 
In 1865 and 1866 there were no reports made to the Treasurer of sales from 
the liquor agent. What was received I do not know, as the reports are silent 
upon the subject. Including the eleven years that I have referred to, with 
the exception of the two years already mentioned, there has not been much 
effort made for the suppression of the traffic in liquors. The amount sold for 
the eleven years, inclusive, makes $1,494.40, while the year previous, while 
the law was not attempted to be enforced, there was $5,574.83 received. I 
do not know but the sentiment of the people at that time was in favor of 
enforcing the law. I had nothing said to me, but that I was pursuing a 
proper and laudable course. 

Q. Is this constabulary force popular in your region ? 



464 APPENDIX. 

A. It is. I think that the people are in favor of the enforcement of the 
prohibitory law. The constabulary are not popular with the dealers ; they 
are, of course, very unpopular with them. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long were you Mayor? 

A. One year. 

Q. What year? 

A. 1855. 

Q. Were you in the Legislature in 1852 ? 

A. No, sir. I was in the Legislature in 1856 and 1857. 

Q. Were you in favor of this prohibitory law when it was enacted ? 

A. I was. 

Q. But was not in the Legislature to vote for it ? 

A. No, sir. I do not know that I signed a petition. 

Q. Did you not sign a petition that same year, for a law empowering 
jurors to judge of the law as well as the fact, in criminal cases ? 

A. I do not think that I did. 

Q. Do you think there has been much done in the past eleven years, in 
Springfield, to enforce the present law ? 

A. There has not been, with the exception of the two years I mention. 

Q. Then for nine years not much effort was made ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. And not as much as there ought to have been ? 

A . I think not. 

Q. Why not? 

A. I do not know why ; but the city authorities did not undertake to 
enforce the law. I considered it my duty to do it while I was Mayor. 

Q. It was manifest to the people, was it not ? 

A . I think so. 

Q. But the people let nine elections run by, one after the other, without 
endeavoring to secure its enforcement by the city government ? 

A. We used to stir them up some. 

Q. But the people did not elect persons to office who were intent upon 
enforcing this law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Is that the state of the public mind in Springfield at present ? 

A. Perhaps I can give a little light upon that subject, and the Committee 
can draw their own conclusions. There are about thirty-eight hundred names 
on the voting lists of our city, — a little over that number I think. Two years 
ago there was but one candidate up for Mayor, and he received about seven 
hundred votes. Last fall at the elections there were between sixteen hundred 
and seventeen hundred votes cast. A little over one thousand votes were cast 
for Mayor Briggs, who is the present Mayor. He has been in two years, and 
is now on his third year. I believe that at the first election he had no opposi- 
tion. At the second and third elections there was opposition, but his friends 
were stronger than those who were against him. He did not, however, have 
half the vote of the city. What the particular reason was I will not under- 
take to say. 

Q. But the fact is as you have stated ? 



APPENDIX. 465 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How is it with regard to the other large towns of which you have 
knowledge ? 

A. In regard to what ? 

Q. Take Westfield. Do they sell any liquor in Westfield ? 

A. I suppose they do. I understand they do, but I do not know the fact. 
I understand that the liquor agency in that town received about five hundred 
dollars last year. 

Q. Are there any unlawful sales ? 

A . I do not know. I suppose, however, that there are unlawful sales. I 
have no doubt of it. 

Q. Has the law been successfully enforced in Northampton, and other 
large towns ? 

A. I believe that there has been considerable stir in Northampton. They 
had a temperance meeting last year and made a wonderful stir. How well 
they succeeded in enforcing the law I do not know! I think that I have been 
told that they succeeded in shutting up quite a number of liquor-shops. 

Q. Do you understand that there is now any liquor sold unlawfully in 
Northampton ? 

A. I do not know that there is any sold there. I suppose that there is. 

Q. Is the state of feeling in Springfield different from what it is in other 
towns of your section of the State in respect to the liquor traffic ? 

A. I do not know. They undoubtedly come from other towns to our 
town a good deal to get liquor. There are a great many dealers there. 

Q. Are you about as good, in respect to temperance, as your neighbors ? 

A. I suppose there are more drunkards in Springfield, comparatively, 
than any other towns around there. 

Q. It is a market centre, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir. It has twenty-five thousand inhabitants, and the people come 
there to market a great deal, and get what they wish ; and I have no doubt 
they buy liquor. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You live in Hampshire County ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Was that not rather an exception to the other counties of the State in 
this matter? Did they not grant licenses there longer than in any other 
county, when they had the option of granting them or not ? 

A . When the County Commissioners granted licenses, I remember that at 
their last meeting, the board who had granted the licenses were lapped over 
on to the next year, upon the incoming board, for it was supposed that the 
incoming board would not grant licenses ; and that board granted, and were 
lapped over one year. That action was a matter of great complaint. 

Q. Do you recollect whether or not licenses were granted in that county 
for some time, when they were not granted in any other county ? 

A. I recollect that there was a good deal of complaint about that. 

Adjourned* 

59 



466 APPENDIX. 



FOURTEENTH DAY. 

Thursday, March 14th, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and resumed the hearing of testi- 
mony. 

Testimony of Francis D. Ellis, i 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In West Roxbury. 

Q. And do business in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you lived in Roxbury ? 

A. About twenty-six years. 

Q. Where did you live previous to that ? 

A . Medfield is my native place. I was in New Hampshire for ten or 
twelve years. 

Q. In what part of New Hampshire ? 

A. The town of Marlow. 

Q. When did you leave Medfield ? 

A. In 1815. I lived for a while in Sudbury, and then went to New 
Hampshire, and returned again in 1833 or 1834 to Medfield. 

Q. I would like to have you give the condition of things in those country 
towns with which you were familiar in your early years before the temperance 
reform made any progress, and state whether things are worse or better now 
than then ? 

A. They are very much better. I have some facts that I have been 
refreshing my memory with, in regard to those towns with which I am 
familiar. 

Q. State what you know of the town of Medfield, — what you have seen 
and heard ? 

A. We had in the town of Medfield for fifteen years but one tavern, 
which was licensed according to law. We had two stores licensed there to 
sell liquor. I was thinking this morning of the result of the liquor traffic 
upon the men who had been engaged in it there. I have heard no testimony 
here to that point, but the history of the liquor traffic is terrible in its results 
upon the men who have been engaged in it. In the town of Medfield there 
had been but one tavern, and there had been five families connected with that 
tavern since my memory. Three out of five, the keeper and sons in one instance, 
the keeper himself, and in another instance, I think, the wife, became drunk- 
ards. I know of what I affirm. Of the other two, one man took the tavern, 
and in a little while it was said of him that he was drinking too much. Some 
friend whispered it in his ear, I suppose, and he quit the business after three 
months. Another man took the tavern and kept it up to the time his liquor 



APPENDIX. 467 

was taken from him, and he was saved from going to a drunkard's grave ; but 
his sons died drunkards, and he was on the way very fast. 

Q. When did he leave ? 

A. After prohibition took place there. I would say that we had prohibi- 
tion in that county before the prohibitory law was enacted. We had it 
by the towns voting that the selectmen should not recommend anybody to be 
licensed, after which we secured prohibition by the County Commissioners 
choosing a party who would not license anybody in the county. There was 
one grocery there ; the father (who kept it in my boyhood,) tottled into a 
drunkard's grave. The first and second sons took the store, and died in" the 
same way. The third one learned a trade, but became a drunkard and died. 
The last and fourth son kept the store, and went down into a drunkard's 
grave. About the year 1830, and soon after the temperance reform com- 
menced, I was in New Hampshire with a friend, and we went into an 
examination of the results of the traffic upon the men who had been 
engaged in it. We went into, forty towns and examined the condition of the 
families of as many tavern-keepers, and how many do you suppose out those 
tavern-keepers, or their children, or their wives, became drunkards ? Thirty ! 

Q. Thirty out of forty ? 

A. Thirty out of forty tavern-keepers. Those were country taverns. I 
know nothing about the results of the traffic in cities. We became satisfied 
that the business was a terrible business. I had two partners with me. I 
sold liquor under a license. 

Q. InMedfield? 

A. In Medfield. There was a young man in Medfield wno was licensed, 
and I also sold in Medfield without a license, and in Sudbury with a license ; 
and afterwards I sold in New Hampshire. I had in the course of this year 
two partners, both of whom died drunkards. Such, according to my own 
observation, are the results upon the men engaged in the liquor traffic. The 
only wonder is that anybody dare take a license. It seems as if the terrible 
woe quoted from the Bible, is already realized by the people there. : 

Q. What was the effect upon the people in Medfield,— were there drunk- 
ards there ? 

A. I do not want to speak evil of my native town, but it was a very 
drunken place. Almost everybody drank liquor there, — men, women and 
children. The exceptions were very rare indeed. Some of them drank a 
great deal. 

Q. Were there many who were termed drunkards in those days ? 

A. Yes, sir, there were men who would then be considered drunkards. 
There were about forty drunkards in the town of Medfield, out of about 125 
voters. They were not all voters, but principally so. A great many more, 
almost everybody, I may say, were occasionally what is called " tipsy." That 
was the condition of the people of that town with respect to drunkenness. 

Q. Now they would be called intemperate ? 

A. They would be. They were not called even moderate drinkers then, 
but now they would be called intemperate. 

Q. Was the law then in force requiring them to post up their drunkards, 
so that the sellers should not sell to them ? 



468 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. The selectmen used to, annually, (I believe that was the 
law,) give a list to be posted up in the places where liquor was sold, of such 
persons as were liable to become town-paupers by intemperance. That list 
was posted up, and to the men upon that list we were forbidden to sell. That 
list in our town became pretty large. 

Q. Have you any idea how large ? 

A. No, sir, I could not now tell the number; but it was so large that it 
was sometimes mistaken for another list. 

Q. What list ? 

A. The list of voters. I recollect in one instance a man from a neighbor- 
ing town, stepping around and reading the notices that were stuck up upon a 
board, ran upon that, and after reading the names, looked at the head of it, 
and said in surprise, " I certainly thought that was the list of voters, but find 
that it is not." 

Q. In what town was that ? 

A. InMedfield. 

Q. Did they used to send a good deal of liquor from Boston there ? 

A . There was a great deal sold there. 

Q. You used to have a great deal of rye- whiskey, I suppose ? 

A . Not very much of that ; but there was a great deal of New England 
rum and other spirits sold. I have been astonished at hearing people say 
there was as much liquor drank now as then. I can assure you that anybody 
acquainted with the facts, would not say that. I question whether there is 
one gallon drank in that town to-day, where there were twenty gallons drank 
then, — I do not think there is anything like one gallon to twenty. 

Q. Are you familiar with the town of Medfield now ? 

A. I am. It is one of the most pleasant towns in the Commonwealth 
of Massachusetts. It is a beautiful town. Those men who used to be lying 
around there drunk, are now mostly gone. It is a very flourishing and thriv- 
ing place. There is no liquor to be bought there now, and there are no 
drunkards in sight. I suppose there may be some liquor drank. There are 
a few foreign families in the place, and it is said that they do use some liquor ; 
but I believe that the native population of that town are as free from the 
habit as any community in this world. I do not believe that a decent man 
can buy it in Medfield, at any rate. I inquired of a liquor agent about the 
quantity he sold, and he said that he did not sell any. " Does not anybody 
buy of you ? " " Well, I sell a few gallons per year, perhaps." Of the town 
of Sudbury, in which I kept, I do not know as much as Medfield. I lived 
there for some years. There was a great deal of liquor drank in Sudbury at 
that time. There were four taverns licensed in the town, and there were 
three men in the town who kept variety stores. They all had licenses to sell 
liquor. They sold a great deal there. I recollect that in one month in that 
town, (in haying-time,) we retailed nine hogsheads of New England rum, 
besides other spirits. The population at that time was probably fifteen 
hundred or two thousand. 

Q. Nine hogshead in a year ? 

A. Nine hogsheads in a month, besides other spirits ; and the other taverns 
were in full blast at the same time. There was a great deal of teaming to 



APPENDIX. 469 

other places, to the adjoining towns, to market, and a great deal of liquor was 
brought in from those towns. The consumption of liquor was enormous. It 
is surprising to hear people say that as much liquor is used now as then. I 
should think there was not a hundredth part of it drank now that there was 
then in that town. In those towns now, none of the people drink liquor 
as a beverage. I do not know of a man there who uses it as a beverage. To 
be sure, my old acquaintances have passed away, and I am not as familiar 
with the habits of the people as I used to be ; but what acquaintances I now 
have do not drink rum, nor any intoxicating liquor. 

Q. In what year was it that you speak of retailing nine hogsheads ? 

A. It must have been in 1819. 

Q. Do you know the state of things in Sudbury now ? 

A. I am not so thoroughly acquainted with the condition of things there 
now as I am with Medfield. I know men there who drink no liquor. I 
know that they do not all drink as they used to do. I am also familiar with 
the town of Foxborough. That town furnishes a most striking illustration of 
the condition of things under a license law, as contrasted with the condition 
of things under a prohibitory law. That was a miserable, drunken town. 
The village then consisted of a little mean tavern, a red church, a little red 
grocery store, and one or two houses. Around that tavern was almost always 
to be found clustered such a company of men as no decent men would like to 
see ; most of them usually about " half seas over." They were drunken and 
dirty, and everything which you can think of as filthy, belonged to them. 
That continued to be the condition of things until the time that we were 
enabled in some way or other to get prohibition in that county. Then the 
people saw the evils they were coming to, and rose up %nd said, " We 
will have no more liquor sold in this town ; " and there has been none sold to 
any man since. I beg gentlemen to go and look at that town if they want an 
illustration of the benefits that rise from the absence of liquor. Foxborough is 
now one of the most prosperous, thriving, splendid villages we have in the 
county of Norfolk. 

Q. In the town of Medfield, you spoke of one tavern and of several 
stores that sold liquor. Were they all licensed ? 

A. They were. 

Q. Nobody sold without a license, I suppose, because everybody was 
licensed who wanted to sell ? 

A. Nobody sold without a license, because everybody could get licensed. 

Q. Did they all retail by the glass ? 

A. For a time they did. Afterwards, I think there was some restriction 
put in the law, so that they had to obtain licenses as retailers and not as 
tavern-keepers. 

Q. Do you know the sentiment of the people in those towns at present 
about prohibition ? 

A. I do not, sir ; but my judgment is that there would be but one mind 
there. There would be but very few exceptions. I should judge that they 
were very much in favor of prohibition — in fact, I know the majority of 
them are. 



470 APPENDIX. 

Q. Is there anything else in connection with this subject that you would 
like to say? 

A . I do not know, sir, as there is. I very much hope that the gentlemen 
of this Committee and the members of this Legislature will not pass a law 
licensing the sale of liquor again. I hope they will not, for I think these 
instances with which I am familiar illustrate the evils that . have been 
brought upon most of our country towns by the business of selling liquor. I 
think I have given a fair illustration. The change in most of our country 
towns, because of prohibition, is as happy, I think, as in those I have men- 
tioned. In a town in New Hampshire, I sold liquor for several years. The 
results there were the same. In Medtield we had a great poor tax at that 
time. The pauper tax was very large, now it is very small. I know farmers 
there who forty years ago could hardly make both ends meet, who are now 
prosperous and happy. They have brightened up their houses, and everything 
looks clean and pleasant. Some parties have become wealthy there. Forty 
years ago there was not a man who could become rich in that town, but now 
all are thrifty, and some are becoming wealthy. 

Q. And the people generally are in a comfortable position ? 

A. Yes, sir. They have no poor tax comparatively to pay. Forty years 
ago there were petty law-suits continually going on ; lawyers found employ- 
ment there in petty, annoying suits. I recollect at one time, just before the 
town meeting was adjourned, an old gentleman got up and said, "Mr. Moder- 
ator, there is one thing we have not attended to." M What is that '? " " We 
have not chosen our annual witnesses — witnesses to appear in court upon 
every case. We have not chosen any of them." 

Q. They wcrr. very tenacious of their personal rights, I suppose ? 

.1. There was a great deal of contention about little things. In the town 
of Marlow, N. 11., where 1 was, there were a good many farmers that abso- 
lutely swallowed down their farms in drinking, and thereby destroyed the 
happiness of their families. 

Q. Have you observed much about the state of things here in Boston ? 

. t. I have been an observer, sir. I have taken a great deal of interest 
(since 1 have given up the sale of liquor), in this matter. 

Q. Do you begin yet to see any effect from the enforcement of the 
prohibitory law ? 

A. I think we do within a year past. 

Q. How does it manifest itself? 

A. I stepped into a very respectable saloon where I used to go and buy 
bread, (not for any other purpose.) I found that the liquor was absent. I 
rejoiced and told the keeper that I was glad of it. I learned that it was 
missing because the State Constable was coming there, and he had put it out of 
the way to be sold no more ; he had put it entirely out of the way and stopped 
the business. I noticed another place where I knew it was sold formerly by 
the glass, but where it is not sold now. I have not witnessed, as I did years 
ago, drunkenness in the streets. I think that during the war there was an 
increase of intemperance; but I think that now, since the work of really 
stopping the sale has commenced, there is a great decrease in the amount o( 
intemperance. In the instances of which I speak, I am very confident that 



APPENDIX. 471 

nothing but the absence of liquor has reduced the amount of drunkenness 
and promoted the prosperity of the people. I believe that to be the sole 
cause. I believe that just so far as the sale of liquor is diminished in this 
city, just s,o fast will drunkenness be diminished. 

Q. (By Mr. Ciiild.) At what time did the temperance reform, in the 
town you have referred to, begin ? 

A. At the time of the commencement of the reformation I was in New 
Hampshire, but I think that it begun about the year 1828 or J829. 

Q. What were the means employed for the reformation ? 
* A. . It was gathering up the facts, — the showing, as I have attempted to 
show here, the results of intemperance. 

Q. Were frequent meetings held ? 

A. Yes, sir; and lectures. I recollect the Journal of Humanity, the 
first temperance paper published in this State. I recollect that that paper 
and Dr. Hewett's efforts in New Hampshire, produced considerable effect. 

Q. How long after the commencement of these efforts was it, before there 
was any perceptible change ? 

A. When I returned from New Hampshire, after an absence of fifteen 
years from my native town, I found the same habits among the people as when 
I left. There may have been a diminution of intemperance, and perhaps 
there was ; perhaps they were beginning to see the evils of intemperance. I 
returned in 1833, and we stopped the sale of liquors I think, in our town, 
about the year 1837 or 1838. 

Q. Was it stopped by the voluntary voting of the people of that town ? 

A. After considerable effort we secured a vote of the people, instructing 
the selectmen not to license. 

Q. When did this marked change which has since continued, seem to 
reach its full effect, — at what period ? 

A. We began to see its effects the moment we took the liquor away from 
the hotels, more clearly than ever before. A man continued to keep the 
hotel in that place for a while, but he did not sell liquor. This was about the 
time of which I just spoke, — 1837 or 1838. 

Q. As the reformation progressed, how long was it before the face of 
things became fully changed ? 

A. Well, sir, there were men there who continued to drink even after we 
took this liquor away, and some of them who had formerly drank, were 
reformed. I know several men in that town, who were intemperate men, and 
were hastening down to drunkards' graves, were saved, and merely because 
the liquor was taken away from them and they were not tempted by it. 

Q. What was the state of things in 1849 and 1850 ? 

A. They were prosperous. 

Q. The drinking usages of the people had very much changed by 1850 ? 

A. After we got prohibition they changed. The change began as soon 
as the liquor was taken from the place. 

Q. Does Foxborough join Med field ? 

A. No, sir ; but I was also familiar in Foxborough. 

Q. In 1850 the change seemed to have been wrought from these previous 
efforts V 



472 APPENDIX. 

A. Men were becoming satisfied that they could do without drink. Inas- 
much as they could not get it conveniently, they began to find they could do 
without it. 

Q. Do you suppose that the force of any law, unaided by any other 
efforts, could have produced that result ? 

A. No, sir. I look upon the law itself as the result of moral effort. 

Q. And in regard to whatever legislation may be resorted to, that legis- 
lation you would deem the best that would most effectually check intem- 
perance, would you not ? 

A. Certainly I would. 

Q. This reformation, then, according to your testimony, seems to have 
reached its full realization before the passage of the law which is now the 
subject of investigation ? 

A. It had been gradually coming to that. 

Q. During the period that the towns acted on the subject of granting 
licenses, I take it the subject was brought before the people there directly or 
indirectly at almost every town meeting ? 

A. We had several contests about it. We finally procured a victory by 
dividing the house. 

Q. The discussions that annually occurred prior to the town meeting, 
tended to keep alive the temperance feeling in the community ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When the prohibitory law was passed and there was no longer any 
need of those discussions, the discussions and lectures ceased, did they not ? 

A. Unfortunately they did, to a great extent. 

Q. As a matter of fact, after the passage of the prohibitory law, did not 
those efforts by means of discussions and lectures cease, to a very great 
extent ? 

A . Yes, sir, I think they did. I think too many men were satisfied with 
what had been accomplished in securing the passage of the law, and that they 
had nothing more to do. 

Q. Do you think that the leaving off of those discussions was an injury to 
the cause of temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Your opinion, then, is that this reformation can never become perfectly 
complete, or the vantage ground gained, but by constant vigilance, by discus- 
sions of the facts, and constant efforts among the people ? 

A. My own observation has been that discussion, resulting in law, produced 
the change. I believe the law finished up what the discussion could not fully 
accomplish. 

Q. The law was the result of discussion, — the discussion preceded the law, 
and when the law was obtained the discussion ceased ? 

A. In a measure. 

Q. When that discussion ceased, the cause of temperance did not advance 
as it had before ? I ask the question as a matter of fact. 

A. There seemed, in the towns of which I speak, not much to do after 
that. 

Q. And was the same true of other towns ? 



APPENDIX. 473 

A. I suppose so. 

Q. When that discussion ceased, did it not cease all through the State, to 
a very great extent ? 

A. I think it did, in a measure. 

Q. Has it not diminished compared with what it was from 1825 to 1840 ? 
Comparing the last fifteen years with that period, was there not far less active 
co-operation and discussion of the facts than there was during the fifteen 
years prior ? 

A. I think there has been ; but it strikes me there is more discussion than 
there has been for the past few years. 

Q. What is that discussion upon— the enforcement of the law, or the 
great fundamental moral principle upon which the law is founded ? 

A. I think on both. 

Q. But which has had the highest place in this discussion ? 

A. I think that the working of the new processes of the law has induced 
discussion upon the great principles of temperance. 

Q. . Then, so far as Boston and other places are concerned, the ceasing of 
that discussion and of moral efforts, consequent upon the passage of the pro- 
hibitory law, proved unfortunate to the progress of the cause of temperance ? 

A. It has not been sustained as it ought to have been. 

Q. What is your opinion of the drinking usages of the community during 
the last fifteen years, compared with what they were during the fifteen years 
prior— say from 1830 to 1845? 

A . I think that some classes of the people drink more now than they 
did twenty years ago. 

Q. Has not the use of liquor as a beverage for the purposes of conviviality 
been increasing in the community ? 

A. Not among my acquaintances. 

Q. Do you understand that it has among any class ? 

A. I hear men assert it ; I cannot speak from my own knowledge. Very 
few of my acquaintances drink any. 

Q. Did that system of licensing, or not licensing, according to the action 
of the towns, operate very well ? 

A. It created a great deal of discussion on the subject. 

Q. Was not that discussion and the lectures and the bringing of the ques- 
tion of responsibility upon the people of the town at the annual elections, 
very effective in promoting the reform ? 

A. Yes, altogether, they were. 

Q. As a whole, I mean ; I put them altogether ? 

A. As a whole they were ; and I was about to say in this work we had 
almost to fight. It was for a time dangerous for a man to attempt to lecture 
upon the subject of temperance. 

Q. But after this discussion, after you were brought by this discussion to 
take the responsibility of closing the shops, it was different ? 

A. It was different after the liquor was removed. But we found that we 
had a pretty powerful enemy to contend with. 

Q. But the closing of the shops, consequent upon this discussion, etc., 
produced very great results ? 
60 



474 APPENDIX. 

A. You must judge for yourself about that. 

Q. Do you observe anything in the system of measures then used which 
led to the action of the towns in closing the shops, — is there anything wanting 
in that system for the accomplishment of the great object ? 

A. We felt that the great object was to get rid of the liquor. 

Q. And you got rid of it in that way ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you see that anything further was wanting ? 

A. To get rid of the liquor was what we most wanted. 

Q. You got all you wanted, then ? 

A. Yes, after we were free of the liquor. The town continued to 
labor with the people who were in the habit of drinking, to get them to give 
it up. 

Q. You spoke of Foxborough. What is the population of that town ? 

A. I am not able to say. It has increased very much since that time. 

Q. You regard it as a prosperous, thriving town ? 

A. It is a very thriving town. 

Q. Do you consider that the results of the temperance reformation, in the 
change that v/as wrought upon the people, were as great in the town of Fox- 
borough as in Medfield ? 

A . I consider that a fair sample. 

Q. What would you say if the State agent in the town of Foxborough 
had been selling every year from $1,500 to $2,000 worth of liquor, and every 
year increasing the sale ? 

A . I should say that it was more than I expected. At the same time, I 
should say that it was not a hundredth part of what was formerly sold. 

Q. Do you know that in 1864 they sold $1,446 worth of liquor at that town 
agency ? 

A. I have made no inquiries about that. 

Q. Or that in 1865 they sold to the amount of $1,939.20 ? 

A. I know nothing about it. 

Q. Or that last year they sold $2,170 worth in the town of Foxborough ? 

A. I was not aware of it. 

Q. Had you known those facts, would it have modified at all your opinion 
as to the success of the law in checking the use and sale of liquor in that 
town ? 

A. I do not know that it would. I form my opinion by looking at the 
town. I knew how it looked then and I know how it looks now. 

Q. You spoke of the city of Boston. You think within the last year 
intemperance has diminished in this city, as I understand you ? 

A. I do not see as much of it as I did formerly. 

Q. Have you any means of observation in regard to that as would enable 
you to form a correct opinion ? 

A. I form my opinion from my own observations. I pass through the 
streets two or three times per day, and I used to see more drunkenness in the 
than I do now. 

Q. Have you examined in reference to this subject the reports of the 
police ? 



APPENDIX. 475 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would not a law leaving the subject of the sale of liquor to be acted 
upon by the several towns be satisfactory to you ? 

A. No, sir, it would not. It would carry endless contention into the 
towns. 

Q. And endless discussion also ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Would not that be desirable ? 

A. It would stir up contention, and it would stir up bad blood also. I 
would not have bad blood stirred up. 

Q. You laid aside your discussion on the enactment of the prohibitory 
law, but you have not overcome the evil ? 

A. Pauperism has diminished; crime has diminished; prosperity has 
increased. 

Q. Your recommendation, then, of the present prohibitory law, is that it 
relieves the public from these discussions ? 

A. No, sir. The recommendation of the law is that it will relieve the 
distresses of a great many families. 

Q. Do you believe that with all this discussion, all these moral efforts laid 
aside, that any law will execute itself, however stringent the law or vigilant 
the officers, unless it is sustained by public opinion ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. If I understand you rightly, you want the law that will most effectually 
check the evils of intemperance ? 

A. That is the great object. 

Q. You do not believe it would be wrong for a farmer in Medfield to buy a 
couple of quarts of cider — you would not consider it a sin for him to have it ? 

A. I think it would be a sin for a man to sell liquor as a drink. 

Q. I ask you about cider ? 

A. I refer to anything that makes a man a beast. 

Q. Do you regard it as a sin in itself to sell liquor ? 

A. I think it is forbidden. I quit the sale of liquor, conscientiously 
believing it to be wrong. 

Q. Do you consider that it is wrong to sell a glass of liquor under any 
circumstances ? 

A. I think that its use is authorized, for instance, in the case of a man 
who is about dying. If I found a man who was about dying, and nothing else 
would save him, I should get it for him. 

Q. Would you buy it ? 

A . I should get it if I could. 

Q. You would buy it, then, would you not ? 

A. I do not know. I have not bought any lately. 

Q. But you would buy it, nevertheless ? 

A. I suppose that under such circumstances I should have to buy it or 
steal it, for I have none of it, and have not had for a great many years. 

Q. Which do you think worse, — buying or selling ? 

A. I have not had any in my house. 



476 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you believe that under those circumstances the buying of liquor 
and the giving of it to a man ready to die is a sin ? 

A. I think you understand my answer to that question. My testimony 
would be, that I think it positively wrong for a man to do a business that is 
sinful. 

Q. But in this single case, do you believe that it would be wrong to buy a 
glass of liquor for the purpose of which you have spoken ? 

A. Is it necessary that I should answer that question ? 

Q. I would like to have your opinion, if you have formed any ? 

A. I have never formed any opinion, for I never had such a case' as that 
come up. 

Q. The State under the prohibitory law maintains agencies in the differ- 
ent towns for the sale of liquor. Do you think that is right ? 

A. I suppose that may be a good provision if properly observed, but I 
would banish the whole stuff from the world. 

Q. What do you think of this State agency business ? 

A. I think it works very well where they have true men. 

Q. As as general rule ? 

A. As a general rule I think it works very well. 

Q. You spoke of Foxborough a while ago, and stated the number of gal- 
lons sold there for the last few years. There may be a great deal of sickness 
in Foxborough ? 

A. I do not know how that is. 

Q. Do you think that the sickness in Foxborough during one year required 
197 gallons of Holland gin ? 

A. There may have been other purposes for which it is used. There is a 
good deal of manufacturing going on there. 

Q. There were $1,427.22 worth of whiskey sold. Do you think the manu- 
factures or the sickness of Foxborough required that ? 

A. I notice that the physicians recommend whiskey very much more than 
they formerly did. They now use it in lung complaints. They used to say 
that it was hurtful. Now they consider it as useful. 

Q. Are you opposed to allowing an apothecary to sell liquor on a pre- 
scription of a physician ? 

A . I will state my own case. Coming up from a fever, a physician pre- 
scribed brandy for me. I told him that I had conscientious scruples about 
taking it, and wished he would give me something else. He knowing my 
feelings, said to some of my neighbors, " I will get the Maine Law down Mr. 
Ellis yet." I dismissed him. I would not take brandy to save my life, and I 
found another physician who could save me without my taking brandy. 

Q. It seems that all your friends in Foxborough would not die rather than 
take it ? 

A. No, sir ; I suppose not. 

Q. You say that you think that every sale of liquor is a sine 

A. Did I say that ? 

Q. I so understood you. 

A. I believe I said that the selling of liquor as a business was sinful. 

Q. Then you do not say that every sale of liquor is sinful ? 



APPENDIX. 477 

A. I grant that it is not a sin for these State agencies to sell liquor for 
proper purposes. 

Q. Where do we get at the principle by which we are to settle what is 
sin and what is not — do we get it from the law of God, or from an Act of the 
Legislature of Massachusetts ? 

A. I think that the petitioners in this case ask the Legislature to do that 
which the Almighty condems. " Woe unto the man who puts the bottle to 
his neighbor's lips ! " It seems to me that they are asking something that the 
Almighty disapproves. I call that sinful. 

Q. I want to know if the same woe does not apply to the State agency of 
Massachusetts ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Then the Legislature of Massachusetts can vary the law of God in 
this matter ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. And nullify the woe ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Suppose that a man be sick in a town in which there is no State 
Agent for the sale of liquor ; would it be a sin for him to obtain liquor from 
any other source ? 

A. It would be a sin for me to take liquor when a substitute could be 
found. 

Q. Do you mean to say that it would be a sin for every man ? Your 
opinions and conscientious convictions enter into the character of your own 
act ; other people may think differently ; would it be a sin for them to buy 
or use ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Then it would not be a sin to sell under those circumstances ? 

A. It would be for me. 

Q. But would it be for everybody ? 

A. There is a prohibition. 

Q. You have said that it would not be. Now do you claim that the 
Legislature of Massachusetts has the right to make that a sin, which is not a 
sin ? I am not now on the question of opinion ; that is another thing. 

A. I do not think that you have a right to do that, which though it may 
not be a sin in itself, will cause others to sin. 

Q. When did you leave off the sale of liquor ? 

A. About 1830 ; in the early stages of the temperance reform. I left the 
business against the wishes of all my townsmen. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) You stated .that the legislation on this subject 
was the result of the investigations and discussions that preceded the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And after the present law was enacted this discussion measurably 
ceased ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You consider that that was a mistake ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



478 APPENDIX. 

Q. That mistake having been discovered, do you now see anything in the 
way of a renewal of those public discussions, and a return to all the moral 
influences that preceded the enactment ? 

A. None at all. 

Q. Then this public discussion and investigation of the facts may continue 
as well under the law as without it. 

A. Yes, sir. There is now much said about the adulteration of liquor, 
that it is not as pure as formerly. In my judgment, that is all nonsense. 
There has never yet been a day, to my certain knowledge, when liquors were 
not impure. Perhaps they were not adulterated as much formerly, as now. 
Then we used to sell considerable brandy. Cognac was then worth from 
three to five dollars per gallon. We also sold a great deal of Spanish 
brandy, — that had more fire in it than the pure Cognac, and many of our 
hard drinkers liked it better. There was a great deal of adulteration then. 
Liquor was reduced below its " bead," and then a villainous compound put in 
to raise the " bead." This was forty or fifty years ago. There was enough 
adulteration then. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Do you doubt that liquors are adulterated now ? 

A. I do not, but I know that they were also adulterated formerly. 

Q. Do you know about the former adulterations being poisonous ? 

A . I do not know about that personally. I know that we used to purchase 
brandy that was called Spanish brandy, but it never saw Spain. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you know whether the physicians of Fox- 
borough were educated at Harvard College ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. Did you hear the testimony of Mr. Derby the other day, in which he 
said that fifty million gallons of domestic spirits were annually used in the 
arts in this country ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Did not the use of moral efforts cease pretty generally after the 
Washingtonian reform in 1843, '44 ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that was seven or eight years prior to the enactment of the pro- 
hibitory law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of Hon. Nehemiah Boynton. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are a member of the Governor's Council ? 

A. I am not now. I had tlie honor of being a member for some three 
years. 

Q. Where is your place of business ? 

A. On Commercial Street, Boston. 

Q. What views have you formed on the matters here in discussion, in your 
experience ? 

A. I can simply say that my own impression and conviction is very strong 
against a license law ; and it is from the fact that I believe that if the State 
should grant license to sell spirituous liquors, the tendency would be to 



APPENDIX. 479 

increase the sale, and increase drunkenness, and thereby increase crime. 
These are my convictions. 

Q. Have you given the subject a good deal of thought ? 

A. I have been interested in the cause of temperance some thirty-two 
or thirty-three years, and have always acted more or less, — that is, with 
greater or less effort, — steadily during that time in favor of temperance. 

Q. What do you mean by temperance ? 

A. I mean total abstinence. 

Q. From intoxicating liquors as a medicine or as beverages ? 

A. As beverages. 

Q. Do you make any distinction between prohibiting the use as a medicine 
and the use as a beverage ? 

A. I do. 

Q. You have been a total abstainer during the years you speak of having 
labored to promote thr. cause of temperance ? 

A. I have, sir. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state how you regard the struggle now 
going on in the State in regard to the sale of liquor ? 

A. Well-, sir, I regard the efforts that are now being made to secure a 
license law, put forth by individuals who are in the habit of selling spirituous 
liquors, and who desire to have a license to sell it, I think it comes from that 
class of people. I have no doubt of it. 

Q. You have not seen anything in the attitude of the liquor-dealers to 
lead you to believe that they are temperance reformers ? 

A. I have not. 

Q. Have you any reason to believe that they are contributing to carry on 
this movement for a license law ? 

A. My opinions are that they are contributing very strongly to bring 
about a change in the law. 

Q. Are you observing any change in the condition of the traffic in your 
neighborhood of the city ? 

A. I think that within some six months, or perhaps four months, there has 
been a decided change. The State Constables have been very active. They 
have shut up quite a number of liquor-dealers, and some of them have been 
fined, and some of them have been let off on probation ; and it has occasioned 
quite an excitement among that class of people. 

Q. Did you ever know such a consternation among liquor-dealers before ? 

A. I never did, so far as my observation goes. 

Q. Taking it as a fact that the drinking usages* of the community are more 
rife at present than formerly, are liquor-dealers usually in consternation 
when business is good ? 

A. That is not usually the case in other kinds of business. 

Q. Do you see any indications that the law has been counteracted by the 
clandestine sale of liquors ? 

A. I myself do not. But I do not move in that class of society where I 
should see as much of it as some others might do. 

Q. Do you see evidences of intoxication in your vicinity? 

A. Yes, sir, I do. 



480 APPENDIX. 

Q. More tban formerly ? 

A. I think it is much the same. The time was, some twenty years ago, 
when I saw much more of it than I do now ; but I have accounted for it, 
from what I have seen since the war closed. I have accounted for it by the 
fact that the war had a tendency to increase liquor-drinking ; and the people 
were under the influence of it to a greater or less extent. Still I have not 
seen so many cases, and people have spoken of it to me and remarked the 
fact. 

Q. You do not suppose that the suppression of the traffic has been carried 
to such an extent as to make it difficult for anybody to get it who wanted it ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. Do you see anything in the execution of the law which is discouraging 
to its ultimate success ? 

A. I do not. I believe everything is encouraging. 

Q. Do you believe the open traffic can be suppressed ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Have you any doubt that the suppression of the open traffic tends 
largely to discourage the use of liquors ? Do you believe there wiil be as 
much liquor drank, when the open traffic is suppressed, in a clandestine 
manner ? 

A. I do not. My impression is that it is getting a little harder to get 
liquor than it was a few months ago. 

Q. You remember the state of things under a license law V 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you ever see the traffic interfered with in the cities as much under 
a license law as under the present law ? 

A. No, sir ; I never did. 

Q. Can you see anything under a license law that could be more favorable 
to the suppression of the traffic than any other law ? 

A. I cannot. It seems to me that it would be a very bad step for the 
State to take. 

Q. You are a resident of Chelsea ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Will you state the views of the people of that city in this regard ? 

Q. (By Mr. Boynton.) In what respect ? 

A. (By Mr. Spooner.) In respect to the execution of the law and the 
general state of temperance. 

A. My impression is that a large majority of the people would be in favor 
of the execution of the "present law. I am very confident that the city 
government is in favor of the present system of legislation. 

Q. Is your Mayor a prohibitory law man ? 

A. He is. 

Q. A man whose views are known on the subject ? 

A. I supposed they were well known ; I have known them well. 

Q. Do you find the people of Chelsea crying out in view of the probable 
suppression of the traffic ? 

A. I do not. 



APPENDIX. 481 

Q. You have observed the various legislative efforts which have been 
made bearing upon this subject for the last fifteen years ? Is there anything 
connected with these facts, with what has been done by the Legislature, and 
what has not been done, taken altogether, which is discouraging to a thorough 
and practical prohibition ? 

A. I myself see nothing discouraging. I think it only wants men of ^ 
determined spirit and efficiency to put the law through. 

Q. Is it a fair case when a city government like that of the city of Boston 
says that the law cannot be enforced, when they themselves have not tried to 
enforce it ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Has the law imposed specific obligations upon municipal authorities ? 
K A. It has. 

Q. Have they, in the execution of the law, any option in the matter ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Are they bound by their oaths of office to carry out the law ? 

A. They are, sir. 

Q. Suppose a license scheme were enacted, and discretion given to towns 
and cities, how would you like the condition of Chelsea in this respect, if 
Boston voted for a license system ? 

A. I think it would prove injurious to the city. 

Q. Do you see any objection to placing the subject of criminal legislation 
in the hands of the different municipalities, politically speaking ? 

A. That is a matter that I have not given much thought to ; but it would 
strike me rather unfavorably. 

Q. Which do you think would give the best prospect of wholesome legisla- 
tion upon criminals, a power like the Legislature, which surveys the whole 
State, or a local power, which is likely to be varied by local interests ? 

A. I should think it would be best to give it to the State, by all means. 

Q. What do you think is the duty of the State, to execute its own laws, if 
the various municipalities prove unsuccessful ? 

A. I think it is the duty of the State to execute its laws.. 

Q. You think the State Constabulary is a good hit ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of Rev. Charles Cleveland, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) We would like to have you give your views upon 
the subject of temperance generally ? 

A. I feel myself favored in being here and giving my testimony in favor 
of a cause that I have loved for so many years. My work for thirty-three 
years has been in the missionary field. For thirty-three years I have been 
among the poor of this city. I have had an opportunity, I think, to discover 
between the chaff and the wheat, between the clean and the unclean, between 
those who are temperate and those who are intemperate. I have seen the 
wretchedness of the latter and the happiness of the former. The old system 
of legislation, the system which prevailed for many years, I always thought 
was very defective. It did not work well. It did not work at all. Grog- 
shops were open in different parts of the city, licensed to sell, and those who 
61 



482 APPENDIX. 

were fond of strong drink could go and get it. Those who dealt In liquor 
■were never very particular in discriminating between those who would use 
liquor rationally and those who would not. It used to be very common to 
have a screen in the shops, and that screen, I concluded, was to hide that of 
winch the keeper would be ashamed to have seen in open day. I once took 
the liberty of going behind one of those screensj and there I saw the shelves 
filled with tankards and bottles and everything of the kind tending to lure 
those who were fond of intoxicating liquors. It came to pass that the keeper 
of that saloon, in process of time, became an overseer of the poor. Who 
chose him ? The rummies chose him. But he has gone to his long home now, 
nnd the Lord has disposed of him as in His wisdom and goodness He saw fit. 
I went to one of the shops lately where the rummies used to throng and 
where lovers of intoxicating liquor resorted. I found the doors shut and the 
windows closed. There was no entrance. I said to a man standing by, 
" What does all this mean ? Why is this shop shut ? " " Why," said he, " the 
State Constables did it." I went to another and found that closed. Said I, 
" What does all this mean ? " " The State Constables have been here." Ah, 
thought I, this works well. Yes, this is the wheat, the other was the chaff. 
I have been a great deal among the poor. I have distributed groceries and a 
little money, and I have had an opportunity of discovering the dispositions of 
different people and of learning whether they are for or against this cause, 
this blessed cause, this cause of God. If people now-a-days would only do 
what the apostle recommended Timothy I would have no fault to find. 
" Take," said he, " a little wine for thine often infirmities." I have done that 
myself, but I seldom take it now. People generally do more than that. A 
man wrote to me from New York, the editor of the " Herald of Health." 
He wanted to know how I lived. I told him I never retired to bed later than 
eleven o'clock. I think that these rummies and those who sell them the liquor 
have no particular hour for retiring, if they retire at all. I told him, too, 
that I rise, the year around, before the sun, and always have done so, and that 
I took no spirituous liquors, and that I hate tobacco because it is the harbinger 
of strong drink. Whether he published that in his paper or not, I do not 
know, and I do not care. 

I do not know that I have further testimony to give except that I think 
that the license system is a rotten system, and always have. Under that 
system every shop where rum was sold was open and was resorted to by 
multitudes. The different streets wherever I went were alive with the shops. 
Now, how is it. Few, comparatively. My rejoicing is that the old system 
hath now no place in the thoughts of those who are consistent in their minds 
and in their hearts. I see many women there in the galleries. I have been 
among multitudes of widows, and the old widows, particularly, I like to help. 
I have a great partiality, I sympathize with them, for I know that many of 
them were made widows by the intemperance of their husbands. I have no 
doubt about it, but I have too much delicacy to ask this one or that one 
"whether her husband was a temperate man or not. 

Q. Do you think it worth while to give up prohibition because the law 
does not do all we wish ? 



APPENDIX. 483 

A. My dear sir, so long as human nature is as it is, it is weak and liable 
to mistakes. I would keep the system which does the least harm and the 
most good, and that is the prohibitory system. Stick to it. I believe that 
you will find those who were partial to the old rotten system unanimously 
opposed to this system. There would not be a single dissenting vote, — no, 
not one ; and if we would go right, we must go against the rummies. 

Q. Have you any idea of giving up the gospel because everybody is not 
converted ? 

A. Not at all, sir, not at all. The gospel is the truth and preaches " peace 
on earth, good will toward men." Rum destroys peace and good will and 
makes people cross. It makes men get up cross and abuse their wives and 
children. Oh, my dear friends, the gospel of peace is a blessed gospel and if 
we would but have the spirit of the Author of that gospel we would tread in 
his footsteps and would seek to do whatever would draw us nearer unto him. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) That gospel is a better reforming power than an 
Act of the Legislature ? 

A. I hope so. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you think it would be worth while to abolish 
the Legislature ? 

A. I would sooner be abolished myself than abolish that. 

Mr. Spooner. Perhaps it may not be improper to state that our reverend 
friend, Dr. Cleveland, will be ninety-five years old next July. 

Testimony of Hon. Amasa Walker. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You understand the question at issue here 
between the friends of a license law and the friends of the prohibitory law. 
We would like to have your views upon the subject. 

A. I think I ought to state, in the commencement of what I have to say, 
that I was not in favor of the enactment of the prohibitory law ; and the fact, 
I suppose, that I have mentioned that circumstance to some of my friends, 
without any hesitation on my part, gave rise to the supposition that I was in 
favor of its repeal. I was not originally in favor of the enactment of this 
law — that is to say, I did not petition for it, neither did I oppose it ; but when 
asked by a great advocate of temperance, now departed, to sign a petition for 
the law, I replied that I had rather pursue a different course. I thought that 
we were gradually making it impossible that liquor should be sold in the State. 
They were making more stringent laws every year. We were surrounding 
the liquor-sellers by so many obstacles, so many responsibilities of one kind 
and another r that I thought that eventually we should extinguish the traffic. 
I was in favor of carrying the citadel of intemperance by regular approaches 
instead of by assault. The friends of temperance thought best to go on and 
get this law enacted. It was passed in the Legislature by a large majority. 
I considered that it was a good law. It was just such a law as Massachusetts 
ought, to have and ought to have sustained, because all true men — that is, all 
true friends of temperance as we recognize them — desired the utter abolition 
of the traffic, and this would do it exactly ; but, as I anticipated, in my 
own county it met a most tremendous opposition — an opposition like that 
encountered by no other law ever enacted in this Commonwealth. That 



484 APPENDIX. 

law has continued upon the statute book for fifteen years, and now, to my 
mind, the idea of engrafting upon it, as is proposed, a license law, is 
simply an absurdity. License engrafted upon prohibition ! The two things 
are totally antagonistic. Abolish your prohibitory law if you adopt a license 
system, most assuredly. I cannot conceive how any one can consider it possi- 
ble to engraft a license law upon a prohibitory law like that which we now 
have. I go for sustaining the law as it is, because, in the first place, it is a 
good law, and in the second place it is a popular law. To be sure that I was 
right in that idea, I went to Webster's dictionary, and I found the definition 
of the word " popular" to be " that which is pleasing to the people in general." 
Taking that definition, I am sure that this is a popular law in Massachusetts. 
I am entirely sure that the masses of the people are strongly in favor of this 
law — of the people, I say. It is popular because it has not been repealed ; 
and when I say " people," I include mothers as well as brothers, women as 
well as men. I have never advocated female suffrage, nor have I ever opposed 
it ; but I am quite certain if the women could vote upon this question, they 
would not vote for the repeal of the prohibitory law. You would not get one 
vote in a hundred for such repeal, perhaps not one in a thousand. The women 
are the special sufferers by the liquor traffic. Another reason why I am 
opposed to this change is that all the liquor-dealers, and the moderate as well 
as immoderate drinkers, desire to have the sale of liquor licensed, at least that 
is my opinion from what observation I have made ; they all desire it. That, 
to my mind, is conclusive evidence that we ought not to license. If I knew 
of no other fact, that one fact would settle the matter in my own mind. We 
have learned a great many lessons out of the great conflict of the rebellion. 
We learned that just what the rebels wanted was just what we ought not to 
let them have ; so now when we are trying to restrict, precisely what they 
want is precisely what it will not do for them to have, if we mean to have 
a united, prosperous and happy people. We must organize loyalty and 
not disloyalty — loyalty to the North and not disloyalty. These reasons 
are conclusive to my mind. I will notice some of the fallacies that are 
scattered abroad by those who are interested in this matter, and which 
have a great influence upon the popular mind, and especially upon the 
minds of those who believe the fallacies. The first is that intemperance has 
increased under this law. Now, sir, I maintain that there is no proof of this ; 
but if it is true, has not incendiarism increased also within the last fifteen 
years ? I suppose it has increased one hundred per cent. Your insurance 
officers will tell you that it has increased one hundred, and probably three hun- 
dred per cent. We know the fact that it has enormously increased, so that 
our fire insurance companies are increasing in number and gaining in business 
in consequence of incendiarism. There is also another fact, that the popu- 
lation has increased. Since this law was enacted it must have increased 
about forty per cent. From 1850 to 1860 it increased thirty-three per cent., 
and the increase up to 1865 must have been as great as forty per cent. Now, 
unless there is forty per cent, more intoxication at the present day than there 
was wheft this law was enacted, there is no increase at all. Now, if you 
add forty per cent, to what existed at the time of the enactment of this law, 
you will cover all the increase of intemperance. I know that there is a great 



APPENDIX. 485 

change. I know that several unfortunate things have occurred. One is, that 
we have imported European vices, — degrading European vices. One of those 
vices is the drinking of lager beer. It came with our German population, — 
a fine population, but they bring over that miserable vice. They have intro- 
duced the use of the worst liquor ever drank by human lips — lager beer. It 
is so fascinating, — it does not intoxicate. I have heard the point gravely 
argued in a court in Massachusetts, that lager beer did not intoxicate, — as if 
people would drink it if it did not intoxicate. That insiduous article has 
done more than anything else to demoralize the public, so far as the drinking 
of intoxicating liquors is concerned. Then we have had more or less demor- 
alization because of the war, as I have just said, although I think that there 
has been less demoralization than we had reason to fear. Still there has been 
a great deal. All history shows the demoralizing tendency of wars. Then, 
again, we have had the demoralization resulting from a very inflated currency. 
Some may smile at that remark, but it is true that a false standard of value 
demoralizes public sentiment. It creates reckless extravagence, — reckless 
expenditure everywhere. It destroys the moral sentiment of the people ; 
nothing, perhaps, destroys it so much. It was the opinion of Richard Cobden, 
and he expressed it to me in 1823, that the demoralization of our currency in 
this country, was greater than the demoralization of slavery. We have that 
demoralization now in its worst form. We have a currency demoralized by 
fifty per cent., which has not been without its influence in producing the. 
present state of affairs. Another fallacy is this : that licensing will stop 
illicit selling. I believe it is laid down as a settled fact by the friends of 
the license system, that if we grant licenses it will stop all this illicit selling. 
But it has been shown that when you did license it did not stop illicit selling. 
How then will it stop it now when we have so great an illicit sale ? Suppose, 
for example, you go into a country town. Take my own town, — you may as 
well take that as any, — a small country town of three thousand inhabitants. 
Suppose one man is licensed there to sell liquor. He will be willing to pay a 
large sum for a license. Will there not, after granting this license to him, be 
the same inducement for all these little shanties around the outskirts of the 
village to sell, that there it now ? Precisely ; and they will do it. But it is 
said that those who are licensed will be interested to stop such sale. There 
are a great many interested to stop it now. They do not succeed, but they 
expect to finally. But their success will not be in consequence of any license 
law ; it will be in consequence of something else, that we hope to notice 
directly. Again, it is said that stopping the sale will only increase it, — that 
those who could not get it in respectable places, would seek it in the low, 
cheap groggeries. I regard that position as entirely false. Undoubtedly it is 
false, because we perceive that the liquor-dealers are so anxious that we 
should license the sale. Would they want a license law that was going to stop 
the traffic in liquors ? Would they be in favor of a license system that would 
restrict the use of intoxicating drinks ? Most certainly not. No one believes 
that for a moment ; yet that fallacy is often presented to the public mind, — 
that licensing will stop the sale : but those who are selling know that it will 
not stop the sale at all. 



486 APPENDIX. 

Another argument made is that the present law is arbitrary. I suppose 
that all laws are arbitrary ; they compel obedience to certain conditions. If 
Massachusetts has enacted a law, and kept that law upon the statute book for 
fifteen years, notwithstanding the most powerful combinations that were ever 
made to overthrow the law, can such a law be said to be an arbitrary one ? 
Can a law that the people choose to keep, and intend to have, be called arbi- 
trary ? Certainly not ; and the great question comes up whether Massachu- 
setts is going to adopt a principle that if a law is not obeyed, the Legislature 
should repeal it. We are coming to that point. The opponents of prohibi- 
tion are seeking to repeal a law because it is not executed. That is another 
point that I would make. It is a popular fallacy that the law cannot be 
enforced. I believe that the reverse of that is, in fact, the cause of this move- 
ment. They know that it is going to be enforced ; they know that the State 
Constabulary is going to enforce it, and that is the reason of this tremendous 
effort to have it repealed. We have brought the thing to a crisis now. You 
remember that in the earlier part of the war that we were very afraid of hurting 
the rebels. We had military commanders who did not want to do them much 
harm. At last we had some commanders who intended to make serious busi- 
ness and whip the rebels out, and it was accomplished. We have just now 
come to the point where we are going to enforce this law, or else no Massa- 
chusetts law can be enforced, if there is opposition to it. We have a State 
Constabulary. The truth is, that the population of this State has not only 
increased forty per cent., but that forty per cent, has been a foreign element, 
to a great extent. We have a large imported foreign element in our popula- 
tion ; a population raised in another country, with other ideas, with other 
habits, and all that population has taken sides with the liquor interest. Of 
course there are exceptions, but we know that the mass of them, owing to 
their previous habits, throw their whole influence, their whole power at the 
ballot-box, on the side of the liquor interest. This is strikingly so in the city 
of New York. We know how it is New York City cannot govern itself. 
They are satisfied of that ; they are satisfied that they cannot maintain self- 
government, and consequently they called upon the Legislature of the State 
for a metropolitan police force, and they got a metropolitan police force, and 
everybody is thankful for it. It was an absolute necessity. The people of 
the city saw that they could not have protection for person and property 
unless the State stepped in and governed them. That same principle is going 
to run right through the United States of America. I have no doubt of it. 
Wo have got to have our State Constabulary. Why ? Because we need a 
constabulary force that is independent of local things. Our town officers 
have become notoriously inefficient in everything relating to police matters. 
They have become almost a nullity. They will do anything popular, but the 
moment there is anything to face, — whenever there is anything that will endan- 
ger " my election," an officer will not hazard a single vote by arresting a fellow 
that he knows ought to be arrested. Is there not a great deal of that feeling 
in this country, and is it not growing worse and worse every year ? It cer- 
tainly is, or I am very much mistaken. Now we have a police, such as I hope 
will be sustained and made still more efficient, and men appointed on the 
force, not because they want places, but because the State wants them to 



APPENDIX. 487 

ser ve — energetic, faithful men — energetic, vigilant men. I hope they will 
appoint loyal men ; men loyal to the law, men who want the law enforced. 
Then there can be no doubt as to the result of this movement. I have no 
doubt at all of the result. The law can be enforced, and that is what those 
who are opposed to it fear. I trust it will be enforced. Massachusetts has 
led in almost all great reforms, and now do we want to back out of this, after 
we have passed a good law, and kept it on the statute-book for fifteen years, 
and it has produced such good results as I maintain it has — shall we, after all, 
go back to the license system again ? Must I have the mortification, in our 
little town, of seeing a load of liquor brought right up in front of the town 
hall and sold for the public good ? I beg to be saved from that distressing 
sight. It would be terribly distressing — it would be one of the most mortiy- 
ing things in my life. I can recollect what has been done by the friends of 
temperance. I can recollect the condition of things fifty years ago. I was 
then an apprentice in a country grocery store, and we sold a great deal of 
rum. I have, in four days, drained a hogshead of new rum, — by the gallon, 
quart, pint and gill. In the summer season, we used to sell in that small 
store that I was in, a hogshead in two weeks, and there was another store in 
town that sold more than that. The population of the town at that time was 
about one thousand, and in that town at that time, taking the year through, 
there were sold in both stores about forty hogsheads of twenty gallons each. 
This was in North Brookfield, during the years from 1812 to 1818, with a pop- 
ulation of but ten or twelve hundred. I was a young lad then, but still I had 
some thoughts about me, and I considered the trouble that resulted from the 
sale. I took one of the streets that ran through the centre of the town, and 
traced it to the centre of the neighboring town, three miles distant. There were 
houses on both sides of the way to the next town, and from the centre of our 
town to the centre of the next town there was a drunkard in every house. 
Sometimes it was the father, sometimes a son, and sometimes it was the 
mother. That was the condition of things, as I knew very well, for I was 
right there in the midst of the sale. It is quite useless for any one to tell me 
that there is now as much intemperance in our town as there was fifty years 
ago. I hear it said by young men, who never saw the first temple, that at the 
present time there is more intemperance than ever before. That is an entire 
mistake. The temperance reform has been a grand success ; not quite so suc- 
cessful, to be sure, as the anti-slavery reform, but it stands next to it, and will 
be equally successful, I trust, in the end. This amount of rum, that was sold 
as I have said, was in addition to all the brandy and gin and whiskey and 
cherry rum. I used to see a great deal of drunkenness in those days. I do not 
believe, on the average, I could say that I now see a man intoxicated so much 
as to reel, oftener than once in a month. Occasionally, I see some poor man, 
(by that I mean unfortunate), some unfortunate man the worse for liquor, but 
it is a rare sight. When I was a young man, it was not an uncommon sight 
to see our respectable citizens, as we called them, drunk, or, at least, under 
the influence of liquor. To say that the amount of intemperance is greater 
now than it was at that time, is an absurdity.. Although the issue is not made 
here, still the fallacy is frequently stated in the community, especially by 
those who are young. 



488 APPENDIX. 

Q. This was under a license law ? 

A. Yes, sir. People were licensed in those days to sell rum for the public 
good. Another fallacy which I see dwelt upon a great deal is in regard to 
wine drinking being so very innocent, and not leading to intemperance. I 
think that is as great a fallacy as any that I have mentioned. It inevitably 
leads to the worst kind of intemperance. That the population of the wine- 
drinking parts of Europe is so temperate as represented I do not believe. I 
have visited Paris, and if I were asked, " Did you see anybody drunk in the 
streets ? " I should say, No, and for the very best reason indeed. You know 
they have a police there that is legion, that is everywhere, at every corner, 
that is ever-vigilant, and the moment a man is discovered the worse for liquor 
he is put out of sight. You cannot see a man drunk in the streets. It is 
against the law, against the police regulations for a man in any degree intox- 
icated to remain in the streets or in the public gardens. When a man wants 
to get drunk he is careful to get out of sight, and if his friends discover that 
he is becoming intoxicated they put him out of the sight of the police; so that 
if there were ten times as many drunkards in Paris as there are, you would 
not see any of them in the streets. That is the explanation of that fallacy. 
I have known from authority that I think to be good, that there is a vast 
amount of intemperance through France, that the population is absolutely 
being destroyed, that the natural increase is being reduced by the use of wine. 
I have no doubt of it. The wealth of France has always been kept down by 
the use of wine, because so many millions of people in France were employed 
in raising grapes for the wines that the people drink. The culture of the vine 
is one great part of the industry of the nation. France as compared with 
some other countries has a great population of poor people, the masses are 
poor and always must be poor while they spend so large a part of all they 
have in wine, in that which contributes nothing to their happiness or welfare. 
That the population of France is decreasing is known very well ; the census 
shows it, and the French people are alarmed because of it. There is not an 
actual decrease, but the increase is diminishing, and if that continues, the 
time will soon come when there will be an absolute loss, and finally absolute 
extermination. The thought frightens them. There are one or two reasons 
for that decrease. One is the existence of the strict military regulations 
which every year puts into the military service 170,000 young men between 
the ages of eighteen and twenty-five, who are kept in that service for seven 
years. What a horrible system that must be, and yet it is carried out in 
France and contributes very much to the result I have mentioned. I will say 
in conclusion that I am earnestly in hope (I say hope, that implies expecta- 
tion,) that this law will be fully sustained. I cannot doubt it, because, so far 
as my knowledge extends, the people believe that they need this law, and all 
this mighty opposition is simply the result of interest, an endeavor to throw 
off the stigma of the crime of selling liquor. A man that can ride in his 
carriage and live in his palace does not like the idea of ever having to look 
through the grates. It is not respectable to look through grates. There's 
where the shoe pinches. That is one reason of opposition to this law and one 
of the strongest reasons why they seek the repeal of this law, because it makes 
the selling of liquor a crime and attaches odium to the seller. I think if 



APPENDIX. 480 

anything is felonious, it is an attempt to poison people or to give them 
. facilities for killing themselves and destroying their children and property. 
If I were a political economist, I think I could make a great argument upon 
the economy of this, showing the wealth that it destroys. I do not intend to 
go into that argument, it not being in my line, but any one can see what a 
terrible destruction intemperance must be to wealth. When I was a young 
man, the farmers were poor. They had to have new rum the first thing, and 
then whatever else they could get they would have, but it was very little else 
that they could get after supplying themselves with new rum. It is surprising 
to see how poor they lived, but rum they must and did have, and if in such a 
town as that, if they bought so many hogsheads of rum they could not help being 
poor. As soon as we got rid of the sale of rum, as soon as we got this temper- 
ance movement in operation, just so soon the prosperity of the town began to 
increase. Mr. Abbott Lawrence was a very sensible man, a good man. 
When he was asked in England on one occasion the cause of the prosperity 
of the American people, he said that it was temperance. At least I have so 
read, and such a remark sounds just like him. Therefore, by every moral and 
economical consideration, I go in favor of the present law. 

Q. Did you observe the effect of beer-drinking upon the English laboring 
classes ? 

A . I associated with the temperance men in England as long ago as the 
year 1843. I went there first when the temperance people were despised 
beyond all measure. I went there in 1843 when it was not at all respectable 
to be a teetotaller, as they called it. The reform started right there in the 
first place. It started on teetotallism. I went again in 1846, and found 
myself in a more respectable company than in 1843. I began to find a great 
many clergymen, and many respectable people who were teetotallers. We 
had a pretty respectable celebration of temperance people under the presi- 
dency of Dr. Johnson. When I went there again in 1859, I found still 
greater change. There they had a great organization — the United Kingdom 
Alliance. They had hundreds and thousands of societies, and raised a vast 
amount of money, and were carrying on a glorious movement. In regard to the 
condition of the laboring people, the temperance societies made it their special 
effort to stop beer-drinking among that class. They saw the terrible effects 
of beer-drinking upon the working classes. Fifty million bushels of grain 
was every year converted into beer and then retailed out to these poor 
fellows who, after they have done a hard day's work, go into the beer-shops 
and spend their hard earnings for liquor, while their families are starving. 
Mr. Bright is making a great movement there to enfranchise the masses. The 
great obstacle to such a movement is that the masses are so sunken, so 
demoralized by beer. If it were not for that, there would be far greater hope 
for success. They are guzzling beer all the time. It is one continued 
stream of beer, beer, beer. I detest beer more than I do brandy or rum. 
Anything else but beer ; I think beer-drinking such a brutal, low, barbarous 
practice. It keeps all those who indulge in it, in a low and degraded condition. 
The English people complain of their condition and say that they are very 
poor. They undoubtedly are poor ; but if they would become teetotallers, 
they would become as comfortable, almost, as the people of this country. 
62 



490 APPENDIX. 

Q' Did you discover that beer-drinking bloated them up or that they bore 
the appearance of a diseased system ? 

A. There is no doubt about that. 

Q. Have you ever heard it said that if one of them was wounded it was 
almost impossible to heal the wound because the system was so corrupted ? 

A. Yes, sir ; it is a sad fact. Drink injures the human system, deteriorates 
the vital powers. In the second annual report of the Board of State 
Charities, that subject is discussed, and the effect of liquor in deteriorating 
the human system is shown. It is a report well worth the attention of every 
one, and it ought to be published as a tract. 

Q. Did you ever visit the breweries ? 

A. I never did; and I do not know as it would be a very agreeable sight. 
I was once invited, while attending a public convention, to do so, — the officers 
of the convention were invited to visit a great brewery, belonging to one 
of the members, but I had no desire to see the way in which the beer was 
made. I have heard it described. 

Q. Have you heard of the effects of beer-drinking and beer-making upon 
the employees themselves ? 

A. I think there can be no doubt about the fact that it injures them. I 
am satisfied from my own observation that is not safe to have anything to do 
with liquor. 

Q. In reference to that class of people, have you ever heard it remarked 
that if one of them got wounded, it was almost certain death ? 

A. I have understood that such was the fact. It deteriorates the system, 
and the person injured stands a much poorer chance of being cured. I have 
heard it remarked that nothing saved Charles Sumner when his brains were 
beaten out by Brooks, but the fact that he was correct in his habits, and that 
he could not have lived if he had not been a temperate man. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you know which has always been the most 
temperate nation in Europe ? 

A. I do not know as I could state. 

Q. Do you know which has always been the most drunken nation in 
Europe ? 

A. I should not wonder if the English had. 

Q. But you do not know which has always been the most temperate nation 
in Europe ? 

A . I have not gone into those statistics. 

Q. Do you know which is the poorest nation in Europe, and always has 
been ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You are not testifying, then, upon generalizations of facts ? 

A. I answer all questions. 

Q. You made a speech — a very able one — but I am endeavoring to see 
what is your base of facts. What should you say about Spain ? 

A. I should say that it was a very unfortunate country. 

Q. Do you consider Spain the poorest nation in Europe ? 

A. They are terribly cursed with poverty. 



APPENDIX. 491 

Q. Are you aware that at the beginning of this century they did not raise 
wheat enough for their own consumption ? 

A. Very likely. 

Q. Are you not aware that the people were so miserably poor that it was 
considered no disgrace even for the students in the colleges to beg ? 

A. I have no doubt of it. 

Q. Are you not also aware that it is the most temperate nation in the 
world in respect to the drinking of wines and liquors ? 

A. They may be the most priest-ridden. 

Q. Are you not aware that such is the fact ? 

A . I do not dispute it at all ! My argument is founded upon American 
statistics and American facts. 

Q. We will take the Old World for illustration. Are you not aware that 
the most drunken country that the world has ever known is Scotland ? 

A. I am sorry to say that the Scots drink whiskey excessively. 

Q. Are you not aware that the Sheriff of a county in Scotland testified 
before a Committee of the British Parliament, that every tenth house in that 
county was a place where liquor was sold, and that the people drank twice 
as much whiskey as any equal population upon the globe ? 

A. I do not doubt it. 

Q. Are you not aware that that is the country where prohibition by law 
first began, continued the longest, and struggled the hardest ? 

A. I was not aware of that fact. 

Q. Are you not aware that Sweden at one time had a law which was 
practically prohibitory ? 

A. No, sir ; I am not aware of it. 

Q. Did you ever hear that under the influence of that law the private dis- 
tillation in people's houses, carried up the manufacture of liquor to the 
annual average of ten gallons to every man woman and child in Sweden ? 

A. It is very likely. 

Q. Do you know what proportion of the whole population of France are 
able to procure even their cheap wines for drink ? 

A. France is a large nation of very poor people. 

Q. Are you not aware that three-fourths of the whole population of France, 
notwithstanding wine is their great staple, are unable to procure it for their 
own consumption ? 

A. If the other quarter drink all the wine that is made in France, they 
must be very great drunkards. 

Q. You undertake to testify as to the wine-drinking habits of the French 
people, and then by drawing certain deductions would have us infer that cer- 
tain facts existing or supposed to exist, were due to the fact that the French 
were a wine-drinking people ; would you be surprised if you were to learn 
that not more than one-fourth of the people of France were able to get wine 
at all ? 

A. I do not know that. 

Q. If it be true, then the poverty of the people cannot be owing to their 
intemperance ? 



492 APPENDIX. 

A . If wine is used, all those effects must come. The people are taxed to 
deatb, as they have always been, to support their vast army. 

Q. Then their poverty is not owing to their drinking, but to other causes ? 

A. It is owing to a variety of causes. 

Q. Are you aware that the land of France is taxed to pay the interest 
upon debts that have come down from ancient tinres, so that not more than 
twenty-four per cent, of the annual yield of the soil goes towards the support 
of those who cultivate the soil ? 

Q. (By Mr. Walker.) Do you mean to say that the debts have come 
from a period anterior to the rebellion ? 

A. (By Mr. Andrew.) Debts that have been gradually accumulating. 

A. (By Mr. Walker.) I am aware that a most frightful taxation is laid 
upon the land, and one of the most intelligent men that I met in France, told 
me that the next revolution would be founded upon that fact. 

Q. Do you not know that at a very recent period, the interest upon the debt, 
mortgaged upon the lands of France, was greater than the interest upon the 
national debt of Great Britain ? 

A . I should doubt that. 

Q. I have seen it so stated on good authority. 

A. I think that it is a mistake. 

Q. That was an estimate made something less than twenty years ago. 

A. There is a terrible taxation upon the land; there is no doubt of that. 

Q. Then one great cause of the poverty of the people, is their heavy 
taxation ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Does that taxation not create so great a poverty among the people of 
France, that they are not able to consume their own wines ? 

A. Undoubtedly; that, in addition to their intemperate habits, makes 
them very poor people. 

Q. The ox that treads out the corn, is himself muzzled ? 

A. It is done to a painful extent. 

Q. Are you not aware that the habits of the people are improving in 
respect to temperance ; that the cause is gaining ground in what used to be 
the most drunken countries of the world, — in Scotland and Sweden, for 
instance ? 

A. That is because humanity is advancing everywhere. 

Q. Humanity is on the march ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. And this advance strikes out from the centre, and here and there 
appears upon the circumference ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that which the law could not do either in Sweden or in Norway, 
has been done, and is being done, without the law. Is it not so ? 

A. They are struggling to get the law. 

Q. But it has been done thus far without the law ? 

A. They tried perhaps prematurely to get the law. They are trying 
to get it now. 



APPENDIX. 493 

Q. In your earlier years, say fifty years ago, you saw New England society 
in what might be called the " Slough of Despond," in respect to intemperance V 

A. I have described it as it was then. 

Q. It was in a very discouraging condition throughout New England ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Growing out of the excessive use of New England rum ? 

A. They thought that it was no sin to use liquor. 

Q. There was then an excessive use of New England rum, was there not ? 

A. Horrible ! 

Q. And that use, since the beginning of the moral reform, has been 
constantly diminishing, has it not ? 



A. Yes, sir. 



I 



Q. Now, what gave rise to that reformation ? In what did it originate ? 
Was there any law by which those oppressed, down-trodden and almost 
helpless people were lifted up ? 

A. The origin of the movement (for I was invited to attend one of the 
first temperance meetings ever held in this country) — the exact origin was 
this : A man was riding home 

Q. I do not want a story, but the fact. Did that reform originate in some 
external law, executed by the bayonet, or by legal force, or in a moral 
conviction, carried home to the hearts and the judgment of men ? 

A. I was just going to state it. A man, intoxicated, sitting on the tongue 
of his cart, and going home, fell off and was killed. A good minister saw the 
accident. "For God's sake," said he, "is there no remedy for this?" He 
came to Boston, and formed the first temperance society. That was the 
commencement of the reform. It originated in the moral conviction of that 
minister that something ought to be done. 

Q. And the people began to understand and accept the principle ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And it was that, which was, in truth, the start of the temperance 
reformation ? 

A. I would say this, that every reform has to commence as a moral reform. 
When it gets to a certain point, it is a political measure. It was so with 
slavery. It was so with temperance. When that reform passes from the 
moral stage, to a political stage, the conflict essentially ceases. 

Q. Do you think that the cause of Christianity (which is itself a moral 
cause,) was improved when it ascended the throne of the Caesars, and instead 
of being a simple and humble gospel, preached by pious men and accepted by 
believing hearts, began to be enforced upon unbelieving and unwilling people 
by magisterial and imperial power, as the second stage in the progressive 
history of the Christian religion ? Was that an improvement ? 

A. Not at all. It was a corruption of Christianity. Unquestionably it 
was not an improvement. No one wishes such corruption now, for they have 
seen the effect of it. 

Q. Is not intemperance, or drunkenness, due to the voluntary use of intox- 
icating liquors ? Did you ever know it to be due to the involuntary use, or 
abuse, of intoxicating liquors? 



494 APPENDIX. 

A. Intemperance Is owing, to a great extent, to the temptations that are 
presented. Remove the temptations and you remove it. 

Q. Please answer my question. Drunkenness is owing to the voluntary 
and abusive use of intoxicating liquors, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir; of course it is. 

Q. Your children, and mine, if they live long enough, will at some time, 
travel outside of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts ? 

A. I have no doubt of that. 

Q. Do you not desire to have your children, and the youth of the Com- 
monwealth, raised up to that standard of manhood that will enable them to 
live beyond the dominion of our own laws ? 

A. Yes^ 

Q. Do you think that any virtue in a young man, which is due merely to 
the absence of an opportunity to commit a vicious act, will render him a safe 
subject to be trusted beyond the reach of his father's eye, or the length of his 
mother's apron-string ? 

A. Yes, if he has character enough. 

Q. But you must cultivate character from within and not from without. 

A. I try to do that. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you not understand that all the common 
people of Spain drink wine as their common drink ? 

A. So far as they are able to. 

Q. Did you hear Prof. Agassiz say that wine was the common drink of all 
the people of Europe, excepting those of the north of Europe ? 

A. I did not hear him say it, but I have no doubt that it is a fact. 

Q. Do you understand, or do you know, that the people of France drink 
an average of fifty gallons of wine for each man, woman and child in the 
country, per annum ? 

A. I do not know that fact. 

Q. You are a man of statistics ? 

A. I cannot have statistics of every kind. 

Q. Have you never understood that to be a fact ? 

A. I do not doubt that it is a fact, but I cannot state it as a fact, for I do 
not know. 

Q. I suppose the children and the women do not drink near so much as 
the men ? 

A. It is because they cannot get it. 

Q. I want to know whether you suppose that one-fourth the people of 
France drink all the wine consumed in France, as Gov. Andrew states ? 

A. He must be responsible for that statement. 

Q. Do you suppose that virtue would be promoted by abolishing all laws 
against crime and vice ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You feel it your duty to teach your children to go to church ? 

A . Yes, sir ; and to go with them. 

Q. And you try to give them the right sort of an education at home, and 
to strengthen them against the temptations of life ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



APPENDIX. 495 

Q. Do you not think that in addition to this influence, it is necessary to 
give the protection of the law against temptation ? 

A. I certainly do. 

Q. And in addition to all this, after you have sent them to school, and to 
church, and taught them by good influences at home, and enacted good laws, 
do you feel yourself released from the duty of praying that they may not be 
led into temptation ? 

A. No, sir. 

The evidence on the part of the Remonstrants was suspended for the pur- 
pose of allowing the counsel on behalf of the Petitioners to introduce the 
testimony of Rev. John Todd, of Pittsfield, after which the hearing of the 
evidence introduced by the Remonstrants was resumed. 

Testimony of Rev. John Todd. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Where do you reside ? 

A. I reside in Pittsfield, in the western part of the Commonwealth. 

Q. You are a clergyman ? 

A. I am pastor of the First Church in Pittsfield. 

Q. Will you give your opinion as to the effect upon the cause of temper- 
ance of this prohibitory law and other legislation ? 

A . I feel that I ought right here to say that I do not want to be put into 
a false position, and I do not intend to be. I do not intend to be reckoned in 
any measure, sort or way as adverse to the temperance cause and to the 
highest good of humanity. I have been an old laborer in this cause. It is 
now forty years, longer than the most of this audience have lived, that I have 
been an advocate of total abstinence. I have preached it and practised it, 
and labored for it and suffered for it, and have been persecuted for it. I 
brought up a family of seven children, neither of whom ever tasted a drop 
of spirituous or vinous liquor until they were admitted to the church and 
partook at the communion table. I was laboring in tins cause in this Com- 
monwealth from the year 1827 onward, until I left the State for a time, and 
then on my return again. I do not think the present generation exactly 
understand the state of things when we began this temperance movement. 
They do not remember the time when a man could not stand up in a meeting 
and preach temperance without endangering himself or suffering in some 
way therefrom. Such was the condition of things when we began. Every- 
body then used intoxicating drinks. At the first funerals I attended as a 
minister, they had rum or brandy-sling and handed it around — first to the 
minister and then to the mourners to comfort them, and the bearers had a 
room by themselves. That is a specimen of the customs of that day. So far 
was this custom carried that on one occasion, in a town I could mention, after 
the funeral service and before the coffin was carried out, they had the tumblers 
and decanters on the table and the coffin, and were sweetening and mixing 
the liquor. In the town in which I settled, the farms were mostly mortgaged 
and the people were in debt, and it was said that 20,000 gallons of liquor 
were retailed in that town, although not all of it was used there. We began 
to preach and lecture and work in this cause, and the first thing that I did 



496 APPENDIX. 

was to get the church to pass a resolution, by vote in a regular church meet- 
ing, that they would not have liquor at funerals, and I thought that was a 
great step. Then we went on forming societies pledged to total abstinence, 
until, in the course of six years, it was entirely changed in that town — the 
town of Groton. Liquor was not to be had there and was not used there, and 
I am glad to say as much liquor is not sold there as in other places. The 
power then used for the suppression of intemperance, was a pulpit power, 
the church power, the gospel power. It was used as such and felt as such. 
After the time of the Washingtonian movement it was different. They came 
in with a sort of tidal wave, and took the ground that temperance was 
religion, and demanded our pulpits upon the Sabbath, and demanded that we 
should acknowledge that a man who had been in the gutter the deepest and 
the longest was the best reformer. They took that ground, and shut up in a 
measure the sympathies of clergymen and good people of the Commonwealth. 
That was but for a time, however. Those who had been laborers in this 
cause did not let go. They held on to it, and they held on to it until the law 
took it out of their hands. Then they could not do anything more. I will 
tell you why. My own observation and experience are that human nature is 
in ruins — the soul, the mind and the body. We are told that perfect health 
is the exception. We hardly meet a man who has not some defect, some 
disease, or some weak spot where disease is looking in, and where he feels 
there is danger : and moreover, we all have that imperfection of bodily 
organization by which our whole being is affected by the state of our nerves. 
The nervous power is that which controls. I used to laugh when I heard 
men say that they would drink because it was hot and then because it was 
cold, and then because it was wet and then because it was dry, and then 
because there was dust in the street. All these were considered occasions for 
drinking, and they were causes for drinking. The body felt uneasy in heat 
and in cold, in dust and in rain — the body felt uneasy, and the quickest way 
to allay that uneasiness was to take something that would touch the nerves and 
thus make a man feel better. This is the philosophy of drinking. It is not 
the taste or the appetite, but the uneasy sensation of human nature that 
tempts men to drink. There are three things that will affect the nerves and 
relieve this unpleasant feeling — alcohol, opium and tobacco, in some form 
or another. The most destructive of these to the human system is opium. 
There are no people in the world so degraded, and where human nature is so 
low and so beastly, as where they use opium the most. We do not attempt 
to touch the use of that by the law, because we do not use that narcotic to 
any great extent. Of tobacco I need not say much here, because it has too 
many friends ; but alcohol is the article that is cheapest, nearest at hand and 
most easily obtained. The result is, that it is the chief article upon which 
man puts his hand to relieve him in his distress. If he has a pain in his 
stomach, or if he is travelling in the cars and is afraid of this or that, he has a 
little flask, and takes a little something because it will relieve him the quickest. 
It is not appetite alone that prompts him to do it, but the use grows out of 
human nature. What the law wants to do is to get in and help humanity in 
her need so far as the law can go. But we all allow that every man stands or 
falls of himself. He has the power of buying opium, going home and eating 



APPENDIX. 497 

it, and the law cannot touch him. The law cannot prevent the use of tobacco. 
The law cannot touch it. The question is, How far can the law touch the 
man who wants to relieve himself from pain and trouble by drinking ? Where 
can the law come in ? The great difficulty then in legislation upon this point, 
it seems to me, lies in human nature. It lies in the wants and woes of humanity. 
So far as law can come in and bring relief, in the name of mercy let us have it. 
There is another thing to be noticed at this time ; in regard to the medical 
faculty. I see that some gentlemen smile at the mention of the medical faculty, 
but it is a matter of fact that physicians in this city and in my place prescribe 
alcohol tenfold more than they did twenty-five years ago, and, I think, more 
than they did forty years a,gp. I have studied to know the reason of this. 
When a man is in danger of paralysis, they give him a stimulant. If he has 
pneumonia, they give him tonic. They use tenfold more stimulants and 
tonics than they formerly did. I have been studying the reason. I do not 
believe it is the mere fashion of the community. I believe it lies deeper than 
fashion. I do not believe that fashion can take men so well educated and so 
high-minded as the physicians of New England, and make them more or less 
fall into this practice. I feel that the cause lies deeper than fashion. Phy- 
sicians will tell you that it lies in human nature. They will tell you that we 
have fallen upon a generation of feeble folks. They have to give us iron and 
tonics and alcoholic stimulants as medicines. I am sure I speak within 
bounds when I say that such things are given tenfold now more than formerly. 
Whether physicians are wise in this, whether or not the after effects are not 
worse than they otherwise would be, I cannot say. I am only speaking of a 
matter of fact, and that fact I think should enter into the legislation upon this 
subject. You ask the reason why the pulpits and the churches of the Com- 
monwealth and of New England stand back. Why can they not use the same 
power that they did forty years ago ? Why can they not, by lectures and 
preaching and moral means, produce the same results as then ? The reason 
has been assigned by Mr. Walker, that when human law comes in, the moral 
power of the jmlpit can go no farther. You will see at once that the 
moment I attempt to rouse up my community upon this subject the result is, I 
put them all to prosecuting. If there is anything done they will enforce the 
Maine Law. Perhaps they ought to, but it puts the pulpit in an attitude of 
being a prosecutor, and it puts ministers in an attitude that they cannot be in 
and still maintain their usefulness in our day and generation. We must live 
in the sympathies and confidence of the people or our usefulness is at an end. 
That is the reason why we cannot co-operate. It is not because we have lost 
interest in the temperance cause. We feel as much for humanity, for her 
degradation, for her distress, as we ever did ; but if the law comes in we can- 
not act as formerly. The law has taken the work out of our hands. That 
has been the trouble with the pulpit for the last ten or fifteen years. And I 
have never been in favor of the law for that reason^ There is another 
trouble ; that is, the moment the law takes hold of a question, which is, perhaps, 
a moral question, a question in a great measure between a man's conscience 
and his God — the moment the law comes in and takes hold of it, it becomes 
a political question, and from that question the ministry are shut out. They 
cannot go into politics, they cannot take any stand when a question becomes 
63 



498 APPENDIX. 

a political one. I do not know but that is the case here. If it is I am very- 
sorry for it, I am very sorry to be here. If it is not now a political question 
and this goes on, it must become so. It is apparent to every one that with 
this state of things, with the medical faculty standing as they do, with human 
nature crying as she does for something that will bring temporary relief, 
even if it injures the system, I take it there must be places where alcoholic 
liquors are sold. The Commonwealth takes the same view. There is another 
difficulty. I cannot make my people feel that the sale of liquor is an unright- 
eous business when the agent of the Commonwealth keeps a bar and says, 
" You may buy here and buy in any quantity." But when a man next door 
does the same thing he will be put in jail. It is wrong teaching. My own 
view is, that the Commonwealth must make her aj>pointments of those who 
shall sell liquor, and such appointments must be under the control of the law 
and under the directions of the Commonwealth ; but I doubt very much 
whether the influence of such appointments has not been to demoralize the 
consciences of the people in that respect. The Commonwealth offers to sell 
liquor as a medicine. The guardian of your children and home may sell, but 
private citizens must not. If they do, they are wrong-doers. Take a town, 
the population of which is ten thousand, one-third of whom are foreigners, 
a town where the railroads centre. These places are open for the sale of 
liquor. The little villages around can shut up their stores and bring in this 
prohibitory law and carry it out and all the principal men of the town will 
help in the work. They can do it because they do not want drunkards made 
there. They had rather go to Boston and somewhere else and get their 
liquor, or have it sent to them by express. You would be very much surprised 
could you hear a revelation made by the express companies as to the quantity 
bought in Boston and carried to the country towns and villages where the 
people do not want to buy it at home. In our town we have not only a popu- 
lation of ten thousand, but we have ten thousand dry ones around us who 
come in there to drink. The profits of the business are so great that we have 
not, or at least we have not been able to, shut up the sale. We have had this 
law in operation for fifteen years, but are not as well off now as when this 
law was put in operation, in my own community. There was a time when this 
law was first promulgated that everybody thought that they would be put in 
jail if they sold liquor, but I should be sorry now to tell the number of 
places where it could be bought. I do not think, however, that our town in 
that respect is any worse than other places of the same size. 

I have one other suggestion to make. Suppose there could not be a gallon 
of liquor bought in Boston, and we could not send by our express companies 
to procure it, it would be no great inconvenience to us to send to some town 
on the Hudson and get it. But suppose that the rest of the Commonwealth 
could not procure it here or elsewhere, what would be the result ? My opin- 
ion is that the whole Commonwealth would rise up and throw off the law and 
open the gates for anybody to sell. You will ask me why I think this license 
law will work better than a prohibitory law. I am unable to speak of the 
future, but only of the past. Gentlemen intimate that this law is being put 
in operation here, and that it is doing wonders in Boston. I am glad to hear 
of it, for we never heard of the sale being suppressed in Boston before. If 



APPENDIX. 499 

this law can do it, God speed it. I am only speaking of 'what it has done in 
the last fifteen years that it has been upon our statute books. There was a 
time when the influence of the pulpit and the moral sentiment of the commu- 
nity was such, that nobody in our place would offer another wine or brandy, 
or anything of the kind. I am sorry to say that it is otherwise now. I am 
sorry to say, that while it is hardly fashionable for young men to go into saloons 
and drink at the bars, nevertheless, there are little drinking clubs made up by 
our young men, who buy liquor and drink it in their rooms, and drink it more 
than ever before. I think if we had even a small percentage of omniscience, 
that we would find these little drinking clubs all over the Commonwealth. I 
cannot say what would be the effect of a different law, but we have not 
received the benefit we expected from the present law. If a change is to be 
made, I want it to be made in such a way that we can bring in the influence 
of the pulpit and the moral power of our churches once more, and enable us 
to effect more by such means for the cause of temperance and for the salva- 
tion of the human body and mind, and for the peace of families, than could 
be done in any other way. I speak this after an experience of forty years, 
not because I have any partiality for any particular policy of legislation, but 
because I have seen and known the effect of moral power. When you appeal 
to the consciences of the people and strike home conviction to their hearts, 
such influences have greater power than the fear of the jail or the State 
Constabulary. 

Q. The question has been asked during this investigation, whether the 
moral efforts that characterized the earlier progress of the temperance refor- 
mation may not be employed in aiding the enforcement of the present 
prohibitory law ? 

A. I have stated that there are two difficulties in the way. One is that 
you put the ministry (and that is still a power in Massachusetts) in the posi- 
tion of being either a politician or an executor of the law, or both, in the 
view of men, and you thereby destroy their power quo ad hoc. I wish to say 
in regard to beer, that while I think it is not as intoxicating as other drinks, 
it demoralizes awfully. We have a large population of foreigners with us, 
and beer is their chief drink. It makes them besotted. It makes them cross. 
It makes their homes unpleasant. It prevents them from rising in civilization. 
It shuts them out from the influence of everything that is ennobling. 

Q. So far as you have associated with clergymen of your own denomina- 
tion, what have you found to be the opinion generally entertained in regard 
to this prohibitory law interfering with the influence of the pulpit ? 

A. I could not say further than that they have been prevented from 
laboring as formerly. I cannot say how they feel. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooler.) How long have you preached at Pittsfield ? 

A. Twenty-five years. 

Q. Do you recollect the Washingtonian reform ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do I understand you to say that the moral efforts that you speak of as 
so effective ceased after the enactment of this law ? 

A. No, sir ; I think the moral sympathies of those who had been engaged 
in the work were lessened by the Washingtonian movement, because they 



500 APPENDIX. 

repudiated us old stagers, and set us aside as being old fogies. But we labored 
on, notwithstanding, up to the time of the passage of this law, then we felt 
that a new experiment was about to be tried by the Commonwealth, and we 
could do no more. 

Q. Was it not generally the case, that when the Washingtonian reform 
commenced, the movement was so novel, so exciting, that the interest in the 
ordinary modes of operation abated ? Did not the Washingtonian leaders 
take the work from the hands of the ministers, and the more sober laborers in 
the cause ? 

A . Measurably, they did. 

Q. Was it not so generally ? 

A. I can only speak for our county. 

Q. How long ago was that ? 

A. I do not remember the year. 

Q. Do you not call to mind that it commenced here in Boston in the spring 
of 1841 ? 

A. I went to Berkshire in 1842, and it came there very soon after. 

Q. Where were you previous to that ? 

A. In Philadelphia. 

Q. Did the movement commence in Philadelphia before you left there ? 

A. "No, sir ; it commenced first in Baltimore, and then in Boston. 

Q. Did not the Washingtonians take the ground pretty much into their 
own hands ? 

A . I think that for a time they did. 

Q. After that movement had abated, did the churches and ministers and 
temperance people go to work in their way as actively as they had been 
working before ? 

A. Perhaps not quite as actively. In our town we did, and I think more 
so, for we felt that we had lost ground, and made efforts to regain it. I think 
we never made greater efforts than we did then. 

Q. But are you not aware that that was not the common state of things ? 

A. I should think that it was not. I do not know as I ought to speak for 
others, but I speak for our county. That was the case with us. 

Q. Mr. Child testified two years ago that the reform culminated about the 
year 1845 ; would you not assent to that statement, as well as you can 
recollect ? 

A. I do not know as to the exact culmination. We did not cease efforts 
until this law was enacted. I cannot tell you of the very summit of the effort, 
but I think that it was about that time. 

Q. Do you know whether there were many total abstinence sermons 
preached in Pittsfield from 1845 to 1852 ? 

A. I preached a good many. 

Q. What are the habits of Pittsfield generally, compared with the habits 
of the people of other places ? 

A. I do not know, sir. We are a very respectable people. I will say 
that, as a general thing, what we call the middling class of society are there 
very temperate. 



APPENDIX. 501 

Q. Intemperance is chiefly found among the lower classes and the rich 
manufacturers, is it not ? 

A. I do not want to use the word intemperance. Vinous and spirituous 
liquors are used by the two classes. I do not think it would be right to call 
them intemperate, for I do not know exactly where that point is. 

Q. There have been no total abstinence sermons, of any consequence, 
preached there, since this law was enacted ? 

A. I cannot speak for other pulpits. 

Q. Do you think that a man who disapproves of this law is debarred, 
because of the law, from preaching the simple duty of total abstinence ? 

A. No, sir. That is not the point. The point is that if you effect any 
thing, you must move the whole community, and if you move them they at 
once take hold of this law and use it. 

Q. Have you observed the temperance movement for the last year or two ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is it not patent to your mind that there is more moral effort now than 
there has been at any time within the last twenty years ? 

A. I do not know that I can say that. Do you mean in behalf of tem- 
perance ? 

Q. In behalf of practical total abstinence, by distributing the pledge, 
preaching the necessity of total abstinence, forming Bands of Hope, organizing 
the Sabbath Schools in temperance societies, etc. 

A. I cannot speak of other places, but I can of my own. We carried 
this movement all along through the war. We got our children interested as 
far as we could. We tried to bring up Bands of Hope, and to bring them up 
rightly. 

Q. Do you find any difficulty with your children ? 

A. No, sir ; the difficulty is with the grown-up people. 

Q. Is there any obstacle in the way of your preaching to your congrega- 
tion the necessity of total abstinence ? 

A . No, sir. 

Q. Why do you not do it ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Then what is the trouble ? You said this state of things prevented ? 

A. I said that this law was an obstacle, not in preaching what I believe 
to be the truth, but it is an obstacle to my usefulness in this cause. I cannot 
get up the temperance societies, and get them to sign the pledge as they did 
formerly. The people rely upon this law, and not upon the pulpit. 

Q. But you say that you can get up Bands of Hope, and get everybody to 
sign the pledge ? 

A. I do not say that I can get everybody ; I wish that I could. 

Q. Can you not get them to sign the pledge just as easily as if there were 
no law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Suppose you have some rich wine-drinkers in your church ; would you 
not be just as clear to preach the necessity of giving up the use of wine now 
as you ever was in the world ? 



502 APPENDIX. 

A. I seem to be unfortunate in expression. The obstacle is this : I cannot 
move my community in the temperance cause, or seek to induce them to give 
up drinking, and to shut up the rum-holes, without appearing before the com- 
munity as a setter-on of the law-folks. I only spoke of it as an obstacle to 
the influence of the pulpit. 

Q. But supposing you preach total abstinence sermons '? You can say, I 
suppose that you do not believe in this law, but that you believe in the duty 
of practical temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now, if you had ten rich wine-drinkers in your church, you would feel 
it necessary to convert those people to temperance, would you not ? 

A. If you doubt whether or not they have temperance sermons preached, 
just ask them. 

Q. I ask you. Supposing you felt that to be a great evil, and you made up 
your mind to preach five sermons upon the duty of total abstinence ; you 
accordingly write them and earnestly preach them to those ten wine-drinkers. 
What would the law have to do with that ? 

A. Nothing, as I know of. 

Q. It is desirable for them to reform ? 

A. Very. 

Q. Would they not think of what their minister said ? 

A. I hope that they do, but I do not know. 

Q. Is it not possible that there are some ministers so situated that they have 
these ten rich wine-drinkers in their churches, and would like to see them 
reform, but fear that it would make trouble if they were to tell them that they 
ought to reform ? 

A. I believe there may be such ministers, but I am not one of them. 

Q. But do you not suppose that there are some ministers who would be 
very glad to shelter themselves under the idea that this plaguey law is mak- 
ing all this fuss ? 

A. Perhaps ; I cannot speak of others. 

Q. Is there really any difficulty in your preaching right at those ten rich 
wine-drinkers ? 

A. No, sir ; I can preach to them, or to any other ten men ; but that does 
not meet my difficulty. 

Q. Let me ask you if you do it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do they leave off? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do they say they do not because of the law ? 

A . I do not know what they say ; I presume not. I do not want to be 
understood as testifying that there are ten rich wine-drinkers in my church. 

Q. You say that you preach total abstinence sometimes. Have you, within 
twenty years, preached an earnest discourse to your people, saying to them 
that it is their duty to give up wine entirely ? 

A. Yes, sir; and I can give you the text. 

Q. What is it? 



APPENDIX. 503 

A. It was in Proverbs: "When thou seest thy neighbor drawn away to 
ruin ; " and the illustration was that in case of a man coming down from the 
mountain, and throwing a rope around their children and dragging them 
away, it was their duty to step in and prevent it by any sacrifice, or by any 
self-denial. 

Q. But they do not see that rope working in that way, when they drink 
their wine ? 

A. This was preaching in favor and in aid of this law. 

Q. What was ? 

A. This illustration that I was just giving. That was as far as I could go 
in favor of the law, and in favor of putting it in operation. 

Q. I believe that you are a thorough total abstinence man, and think 
better of you than it is proper to speak here 

A. Thank you. 

Q. But I want to know whether you have said to such ones in your con- 
gregation as may be in the habit of drinking, — " Gentlemen, this is a wicked 
habit ; you ought to give it up ; you ought to abstain totally from intoxicating 
liquors as a beverage ? " How do you think that ten wine-drinkers in a 
Methodist Church would get along if the rules were enforced ? Do you ever 
preach such sermons as they preach ? 

A. I do not suppose that I preach as good ones, but I preach the best that 
I can. 

Q. Well, on that subject, I do not believe that you do ; on other subjects 
you probably do. You have preached a good many temperance sermons, I 
suppose ? 

A. In my day, I have. 

Q. Have you preached many lately ? 

A. I preach on temperance as often as I think that it is a part of giving 
to every man his portion in due season. 

Q. You have done that since the law has been in operation, have you ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What, then, is the trouble ? 

A . The trouble is what I have tried to state. This law cuts me off from 
the sympathy of the community, and takes away my moral power. 

Q. Do they understand that you are opposed to this law ? 

A. No, they do not. They understand that I want intemperance ban- 
ished as far as possible, and that every proper means should be used to secure 
that end. What I desire to testify here, is my conviction, from observation, 
of the power of this machinery to do it. I am in sympathy with everything 
that will help humanity. 

Q. Suppose your preaching were to set people on to enforce the law ? 

A. It does not do it. 

Q. I suppose that your preaching would not. 

A. No, nor any other preaching that we have in our town. 

Q. Then you have not much liquor-law preaching in your place ? 

Mr. Child. What sort of sermons do you want preached ? 



504 APPENDIX. 

Mr. Spooner. I want Dr. Todd and other ministers to say, — " Consider- 
ing the danger and influence of the use of intoxicating liquors, it is your duty 
to lay them aside entirely." 

Dr. Todd. I have said that in my pulpit within four weeks. 

Q. From your talk you seem to have been preaching a good deal on tem- 
perance ? 

A. I have. 

Q. But you have testified that this law has kept people from talking upon 
the subject of practical temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think it has. 

Q. You are in favor of a license law, I suppose. How many sellers would 
you license in Boston ? 

A. In one hundred and ninety thousand people I do not know how many 
persons I should license, but I would have the charge for a license very high. 

Q. So as to deprive the poor people from from the power of selling ? 

A. Yes, sir, — but that is not the right way to put it. I would have the 
law the best that human wisdom can devise. I do not want to make any dis- 
tinction between the poor and the rich. I know that since we have the man- 
ner of men that we have — since we have the human nature that we have, 
intoxicating liquors will be sold and will be bought, and all the laws that man 
may pass cannot prevent it. Still we must do all that we can by both the 
law and the gospel. 

Q. That is our doctrine. We would use both the law and the gospel. We 
are trying to learn what sort of a law will be best. 

A. I cannot say. 

Q. I think that you have expressed an opinion. Do you not give the 






preference to a license 1 

A. I only expressed an opinion as to the inefficiency of the present law as 
executed heretofore. I understand there has been a great revival of the law 
in Boston. I hope it will continue. 

Q. Do you recollect the time when licenses were granted '? 

A. I never knew much about the old license law. 

Q. But you recollect the time when when we used to have licenses ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you ever hear of the traffic being at all restricted by the license 
law? 

A. I think that it was very much then as it is now ; about everybody sold ? 

Q. Both the licensed and the unlicensed V 

A. I know that the man who sold whiskey one or two cents per gallon 
cheaper than the others, was called the cheap store of the place. The law 
then did not affect the sale, and it does not now. 

Q. Do you say that everybody sold then ? 

A. No ; I do not say that everybody did, but a great many did. 

Q. The law did nothing to restrain the sale ? 

A. I cannot tell. I do not know much about, licenses in this State. 

Q. Do you think it now advisable to give up the present policy of prohibi- 
tion and go back to the old license system, which did so little towards 
restraining the traffic, or shall we try the experiment of prohibition longer ? 



APPENDIX. 505 

A. I do not think that I can judge of that. I do not speak thus because 
I want to dodge the question, but because I do not know which would be 
better. I do not know what effect a license law would have. I do not know 
whether a license law could be executed or not ; if it cannot be, it would be 
no better than the present law, which for the last fifteen years has been a 
dead failure. 

Q. Have you any doubt about its being executed better hereafter ? 
A. I cannot say. 

Q. Do you not think it better, as the matter now stands, to pursue the 
present policy instead of giving it up ? t 

A. I do not feel that I am bound to testify upon that point. I merely 
wanted to show the great difficulty that the pastors of the churches of Massa- 
chusetts have labored under, and I think that I have done that. 

Q. Do you now, as circumstances stand, express yourself as decidedly in 
favor of a license law, as compared with the present law ? 
A. Unless it is executed better than it has ever yet been. 
Q. Just as you understand the matter to stand at this moment, do you 
think it advisable to say that the State cannot enforce the present law, and 
therefore it is best to go back to a license law ? 

A. I have very little expectation or hope that this law will be executed. 
From what I know of human nature, and from what I have seen for the last 
fifteen years, my impression is that as the law cannot prohibit the use of 
liquor, nor banish it, the State must regulate the sale as well as it can. I do 
not want to be misunderstood. You have not yet carried the consciences of 
the community to the point of feeling that the sale of liquor is sinful. It is 
the conscience of the world that is sinful to commit adultery, or steal, or com- 
mit arson. Adultery, theft and arson are universally regarded as sins, as 
crimes against which the laws can be executed. In a republican government, 
a law against an act which the consciences of the people do not feel to be a 
sin, can hardly be executed. 

Q. What do you think of the Sunday law, would you repeal that ? 
A. I do not know enough about it to say. It does no good with us ; I do 
not know as it does any good anywhere. 

Q. We enforce it here so as to shut up all these shops on Sunday. Does 
not this traffic stand pretty much on the same ground as gambling, horse- 
racing, etc. ? 

A . I do not think it does. 

Q. Have you any doubt that the consciences of the people of Massachu- 
setts — of the majority of the people — are in favor of this law ? 

A. Put up this question, make it a political question, and submit it to 
the people of Massachusetts, and I think they would ride over your law. 

Q. How is it that we have had this law on the statute books for fifteen 
years ? It has been in politics every year, and yet been sustained right 
straight along ? 

A. It has not been so before the people in our part, as to make the elec- 
tion turn upon that point. 

Q. If the State is dissatisfied with the law, is it reasonable to suppose that 
it would be allowed to remain on the statute book for fifteen years ? 
64 



506 APPENDIX. 

A. The present movement, I think, shows that the State is not satisfied 
with the law. 

Q. Whence did this movement originate ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. Who do you suppose pays these honorable counsel ? 

A. I do not know anything about it. 

Q. Have you any sort of doubt that it is the liquor-dealers of Boston ? 

A. I know nothing at all about it. 

Q. (By Mr. Moese.) Suppose the Legislature should pass a law by 
which each town in the State should "have the right, each year, to decide 
whether it would permit any sale of liquor in its limits or not, whether it 
would license at all or not, and if so, to what extent ; do you not believe, 
under such circumstances, that the constant agitation and discussion of that 
question each year would have a beneficial effect upon the community ? 

A. I am not able to answer that question categorically. I am confident 
that in our region somebody would be licensed. The State Agency would die 
in that case. Somebody would be licensed by the town. The subject 
would be agitated ; there would be temperance selectmen and opposition. 
How much this discussion would effect in the abatement of drinking, I do not 
know. We think it better to keep the water running than to have it stag- 
nate. There is one difficulty in the matter : several times we have got our 
town to vote so much money to the selectmen with which to enforce this pro- 
hibitory law, but they have never done it. We can never get them to do it. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Supposing one town should grant licenses, and an 
adjoining one did not ; would not the facility with which liquor could be 
obtained in the town where licenses were granted, prevent the effectual oper- 
ation of the prohibition in the adjoining towns ? 

A. 1 think it would. 

Q. Would you be in favor of submitting this question to the votes of the 
towns, and have it made a political question, or would you have it made a 
uniform law throughout the State ? 

A . I think that such laws should be made general in their application. It 
is better for the Commonwealth to make laws that she can execute if she can. 

Q. Then you had rather the Commonwealth should make the laws than 
submit the question to the action of municipalities ? 

A. I do not think that I am a competent witness upon that point, because 
I am not a political man. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You spoke of liquor being carried by the express 
companies to the country ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. A proposition is made to let each municipality grant licenses or not, as 
they may decide. Suppose that three-fourths of the towns concluded that 
they would license, could not those communities where licenses were not 
granted, readily obtain liquor from other parts of the State ? 

A. I think that you must put your hand upon the express companies that 
bring liquor from the cities to the country towns, before you can help us by 
any law of that character. 



APPENDIX. 507 

Q. But suppose that licenses are granted here in Boston, and the sale of 
liquor is legal, how could you prevent express companies from buying it ? 

A. You could under the present law, and you must put the law in force 
against the express companies, or you cannot relieve the people of the 
country. 

Q. Knowing what you do of human nature, do you not think that there 
would be more difficulty in executing a license law, where you give the 
monopoly of sale to a few, than in executing the present law, where the sale 
is prohibited ? 

A. I do not think that I can judge about that. I cannot speak of the 
future. I can only judge from what has passed. I want it distinctly under- 
stood that I am not for this or that particular measure. I only want that 
done which is best for my fellow-men. 

Adjourned. 



508 APPENDIX. 



FIFTEENTH DAY. 

Friday, March 15th, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony in 
behalf of the Remonstrants was continued. 

Testimony of Rev. Justin D. Fulton. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You preach in Tremont Temple, do you not ? 

A. I am pastor of the Tremont Baptist Church. 

Q. Is that a free church ? 

A. It is. 

Q. Which is the best, a prohibitory law, or a license law ? I would like 
your views on this subject briefly. 

A. I have been led to favor a prohibitory law for several reasons; among 
others for these. The first one is, because of the excellence of the law itself. 
I think that the law is calculated to break up this rum-traffic : and that is a 
great thing to do at this time, because the rum-traffic is the foundation of 
nearly all the moral evil that we have to meet with as ministers and as men. 
I am in favor of a prohibitory law now more than ever, because I think there 
is a prospect of its rigid enforcement. There has been considerable said 
about moral suasion, as though this prohibitory law favored moral suasion ; but, 
in my opinion, the prohibitory law grew out of moral suasion ; it is the fruit 
grown out from this tree. We went into the temperance movement, and 
carried it, for a while, by moral suasion ; but we found that there was a class 
of people that we could not reach. And, on account of this class of people 
that could not be influenced by any arguments that might be brought to bear 
upon them, we devised this prohibitory law ; and I believe that if this pro- 
hibitory law is enforced, we can do more in a moral way than we should if 
some such law were not enforced. So far as I understand it, this view is par- 
tially agreed to by many of those who have heretofore testified, and they feel 
that the law ought to be rigidly enforced, but do not think that moral efforts 
should be interfered with. My idea is, that those persons who are in favor of a 
license law are either in favor of drinking themselves, or else have somebody 
near them who do drink ; and that those individuals who are in favor of the 
morals of a prohibitory are nearly universally themselves temperate. And 
thirdly, it has seemed to me that moral suasion will be helped by a law of pro- 
hibition. The objection here made is that we talk about the enforcement 
of the prohibitory, but do not talk about saving men from, intemperance. I 
do not think it is true ; and yet it is true to some extent. There is so much 
said against it that we see a good deal of division. I think that the opera- 
tion of the moral influences in this movement might be compared to the cam- 
paign of General Sherman, while the law acts the part of Grant in holding 
the enemy in check, and finally driving the enemy out of his encampments. 



APPENDIX. 509 

I might say that I have noticed that intemperance is on the decrease very 
much among the masses of the people, and especially among my own congre- 
gation, which is very large, and composed largely of young men ; I notice 
that intemperance has greatly decreased. And I believe, before God, that 
if fashionable men, public men, men of influence and power would set them- 
selves against this evil, it could be eradicated from the land. I notice that 
many people who drink in the cars, and on the highway, are men who are at 
least fashionable, and women that are fashionable ; and it is becoming 
fashionable to oppose this law, and to say that it cannot be enforced. 

Q. What is the sentiment of the people of your denomination as regards 
favoring the present law ? 

A. I think, so far as I know, there is no exception. I do not know 
of an exception. All are opposed to a license law. 

Q. You are in the habit of talking with other persons among your 
denomination upon this subject V 

A. I have talked with a large number, and especially with our city 
pastors ; and all are in favor of the most rigid law that can be enforced. 

Q. There was some testimony here by Rev. Dr. Neale. What do you 
understand his view to be ? 

A. I think Dr. Neale tried to testify very decidedly against a license law. 
He told me he did. He is decidedly opposed to a license law. He is in favor 
of a prohibitory law, if it can be enforced ; but he does not think this has been 
enforced. 

Q. You know of no one denomination that has the reputation of being in 
favor of a license law ? 

A. I do not know of one. 

Q. What is the sentiment of the people generally ? 

A . I think if there are any wine-drinkers among them, they are in favor 
of a license law. 

Q. How is it with your own congregation ? 

A. They are all anti-license. We had a very good test of their opinion 
on that subject. We got seventeen hundred signatures, in about twenty 
minutes, in our congregation, in favor of the present law. 

Q. Is it not true that there is a great deal of moral effort among the 
people ? 

A. There never was so much, I guess. Our last temperance convention 
was mostly about that. Wherever I have gone they tell me that there never 
were so many abandoning their cups as at the present time. I believe there 
never was so active an interest as at the present hour. 

Q. Is there not an increased interest among the Sons of Temperance and 
other organizations which are active in this cause ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And do they sign a pledge in these organizations ? 

A. Yes, sir; they not only sign the pledge, but become active in the 
cause. 

Q. Do you know whether these orders are generally prohibitionists ? 

A. I am not so well posted in this as some other gentlemen, because I am 
not in the way of seeing these reports. Mr. Hodges, and also Mr. Thompson, 



510 APPENDIX. 

who are connected with the orders in this State, tell me that these orders are 
decidedly in favor of prohibition. So far as I know in the city, they are ; 
and I am a member of two or three of them. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you think the prohibitory law has been enforced 
for the last fifteen years ? 

A. I know it has not. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) In Boston, you mean ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you think the cause of temperance has 
retrograded or advanced, from 1850 to the present time ? 

A. I think the war has produced its natural effect. I think there was 
more intemperance then. I think there is more temperance now than either 
before or during the war. 

Q. You think that in 1855, '6, '7, '8, '9 and '60 there was more temper- 
ance than at any previous period in the history of the temperance movement? 

A. No, sir ; I do not. 

Q. Then it was true, was it, that after the passage of this prohibitory law 
the cause of temperance retrograded ? And was it true, as a matter of fact, 
that from 1852 to 1860 the cause of temperance went backward from what it 
was in the earlier and more active efforts upon this subject ? 

A. I was not living in Massachusetts then ; I have lived here only three 
years. 

Q. Are you enabled to make any comparison, so far as Massachusetts is 
concerned, as to whether the cause of temperance improved or diminished ? 

A. I am able to make a definite comparison between this year and four 
years ago. Of course, previous to that I could not give any personal opinion 
as to the relative condition. 

Q. What reason should you give for thinking that the cause had more 
advanced now, if you do not know anything about it ? 

A. I state it because I do know something about it. 

Q. Does not your first statement relate to a period prior to three years 
ago? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. I will inquire in regard to the means of information which you have, as 
to the actual state of intemperance throughout this Commonwealth at the 
present time. What are your means of information ? 

A. I have got observation; I have got a very general acquaintance; I 
have lectured a good deal upon the subject of temperance in different parts 
of the State ; and I have got the usual information within the reach of every 
intelligent man. 

Q. You infer, then, that there are a less number of cases of intoxication 
and drunkenness than heretofore ? 

A . Yes, sir ; I know there are in this town. 

Q. How do you know that ? 

A . I know it by what I hear from the reports. 

Q. What reports ? 

A. I know it by the reports of the police department. 

Q. What are the reports of the police department that you know it by ? 



APPENDIX. 511 

A. The reports of the Chief of Police, which he sends to me annually. 

Q. Does the police report state a less number of cases of drunkenness this 
year than the year before ? 

A. I do not know that it makes any such statement. 

Q. Do you not know the fact that the report of last year, up to January, 
1866, states a greater number of cases of drunkenness than in 1865. 

A. I have not had the report of 1866. 

Q. I would inquire of you, if you can tell whether the number of cases of 
drunkenness in 1865, according to the police report, was greater or less than 
in 1864 ? 

A. The number of cases of arrests, I think, was less. 

Q. The number of cases of drunkenness which they report (not the 
arrests) were they less in 1865 than in 1864 ? 

^4. My impression is that they are less. 

Q. If you are mistaken as to the matter of fact, is the opinion which you 
have formed, of any value ? 

A. So far as the reports of the police go, I suppose they are correct. 

Q. Is your own judgment better than the actual reports of the police ? 

A. I do not wish, by any means, to say anything that would do disrespect 
to anybody; but I have an impression, whether it is well grounded -or not, 
that you have got to read the whole report, and take the general bearings of 
it, and not just the mere statements of the number of arrests ; as, for instance, 
if I saw that a large number of liquor establishments, where a great deal of 
liquor had been sold, had been Closed, and if the outward exhibitions of 
drunkenness were less, I should claim, whether these reports, or any other 
reports said it was not, that the amount of drunkenness was less. 

Q. You say that you get your means of observation from the general 
bearing and the whole scope of the reports. What better means have you of 
ascertaining the progress or increase of intemperance, than by the number of 
known cases of drunkenness, of which everybody knows that the police reports 
do not show more than one half ? What better means have you than that ? 

A. Well, I do not know what bearing that has upon it ? 

Q. I ask you if you have got better means of inferring as to the increase 
or decrease of intemperance, than you get from the number of cases of intem- 
perate persons that come within the control of the police ? 

A. I should think so, certainly. 

Q. Now, if these arrests were greater in 1865 than they were in 1864, 
what means have you got to show, or to base your opinion upon, that intem- 
perance has diminished ? 

A. I take this ground : that, out of nineteen hundred and fifty liquor- 
shops, as I read in the report of the Chief of Constabulary, one thousand 
have been closed. I judge from that that there is a great deal less liquor sold 
than there was. I know that, when I came to Boston, there were five shops 
between my house and Tremont Temple. I know it is not so now. I used to 
see men drunk on the Sabbath. I have not seen a man drunk this week ; 
and I do not believe there have been many drunkards on the Sabbath, lately, 
as compared with the number formerly. 



512 APPENDIX. 

Q. That is a question we shall come to hereafter. I want to get at the 
basis of your opinion. You say you rely more upon the fact that the State 
Constabulary report a thousand liquor-shops, closed than you do upon the 
actual cases of intemperance reported by the police ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You think that is more reliable evidence, do you ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Suppose that there are a thousand liquor-shops shut up, and yet that 
there is an increase of drinking and in the amount of drunkenness, will the 
closing of the liquor-shops be any evidence ? 

A . I should not suppose it. 

Q. If it were the fact, you would infer that the closing of the liquor-shops 
had not diminished that ? 

A. Well, sir, for instance, Inave a report taken from a morning paper of 
four weeks ago, I think, that for the first time for many years there were 
only eight arrests, I think (I did not bring the number with me), on Saturday, 
and not one arrest in the twenty-four hours just following. I know that when I 
came here three years ago, the number of arrests was greater ; and the want 
was patent to everybody that there should be a power to shut up these places. 

Q. By what means do you assert positively ? Have you means of knowing 
the extent of drinking usages in Boston ? 

A. I have a very large congregation, and I have two missionaries to assist 
me, and have conversed with other clergymen. 

Q. Do you think, yourself, that in a congregation of two thousand out of a 
population of a hundred and ninety thousand, you would have information 
with positiveness as regards the general habits of temperance or intemperance ? 

A. I could do it if I had no congregation. 

Q. Do you see a tenth or a hundredth part of the drunkenness in the 
city? 

A. I cannot say as to that. I know that if it was so, I should see it. 

Q. Do you mean to say that there cannot be a thousand cases of drunken- 
ness in a week and you not see them ? 

A. I presume there may be. 

Q. Then how can you say, from your own observation, that you know 
there is less drunkenness now than at a certain time, when you say that you 
do not know anything about a thousand cases that may happen during the 
week? 

A. I do not say that I do not know of them. 

Q. Do you now say that you do know of all the cases of drunkenness in 
Boston. 

A. No, sir; I do not. 

Q. Now, how can you say that, from your observation, there is less drunk- 
enness now than at that time, when you admit that there might be a thousand 
cases of drunkenness that you do not know anything about ? 

A. I should have to suppose that there were four or five thousand cases 
several years ago that I did not know anything about. 

Q. You know nothing about the old temperance movement as spoken of 
here? 



APPENDIX. 513 

A. Nothing, except what I have heard. 

Q. You spoke of associations in aid of the cause of temperance. Are 
these extended throughout the Commonwealth ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are they secret societies ? 

A. They are, to some extent. 

Q. Have you secret pass-words ? 

A. I rather think there are. 

Q. Do you know ? 

A. If there are I never remember them over night, but I always get in. 

Q. Do you know that there are pass-words used ? 

A . No, I really do not know much about it. 

Q. Do you not know now that they have secret pass-words ? 

A. I suppose that if I should answer this question, I should have to know 
a pass-word. 

Q. Is it not a rule in these organizations that there is to be a secret pass- 
word, that those initiated have to give when entering one of these meetings ? 

A. I should have to say that I presume it is true. 

Q. I would inquire of you if you have a great moral cause ? You so 
regard the cause of temperance, do you not ? 

A. I do, undoubtedly, sir. 

Q. Do you think a great moral cause is to be promoted by secret 
associations ? 

A. Yes ; I have an idea that we ought to have some sort of an association 
to come in contact with this liquor association which has been formed. 

Q. I wish to know if you think a moral cause like the cause of temperance, 
enjoined by the bible, can be well promoted by secret organizations scattered 
ail over the Commonwealth ? 

A. I wish to state that I did not state that this moral work was carried on 
entirely by them. The question was asked, if I knew anything about these 
associations, and if they were engaged in the moral work. 

Q. You say you are a member of three V 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you say that you do not know anything about them ? 

A. No, sir ; I should say that I did know something about them. 

Q. Are the members of these associations pledged not to reveal what is 
there done ? 

A . I do not know whether they are or not. 

Q. Did you go through any form of taking an obligation not to reveal ? 

A. I do not think I did. 

Q. Do you not know ? 

A . I should have to ask somebody ; I do not know that I did. I went in 
simply to save a man, into each of these societies. 

Q. You say you cannot tell whether you took an obligation not to reveal ? 

A. No ; I do not think I did. 

Q. Do you think you did know ? 

A. I said once that I thought I did not. 
65 



514 APPENDIX. 

Q. I have here a copy of a sermon purporting to have been preached by 
you in Tremont Temple, February 10, 1867, in which you say :— " But 
respectable men do not want a commissioner from such a power to act for 
them, so they hire a man to stand six days in the Exchange to ask men to 
sign their petition for a license ; so that the Boston Journal may announce the 
pleasing intelligence that Alpheus Hardy and other ' solid ' men of Boston 
have asked for a license, when it is known, and is now notorious, that the same 
Alpheus Hardy rents one of the leading bar-rooms of Boston, where young 
men in droves are thronging this broad road to death." Do you regard that, 
if that be true, as disreputable for any man to do ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you know, when you made that statement, that that statement 
against Mr. Hardy was true ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How did you know it ? 

A. In various ways : one way was by Mr. Hardy's letter. 

Q. When was the date of that letter, compared with the time of preaching 
that sermon ? 

A . The date was two days before, I think. 

Q. Are you sure about that ? 

A. Well, yes ; I think so. 

Q. I want to know if you have any means of knowing that that charge 
was true ? 

A. I know this, that that same Alpheus Hardy was one of the trustees 
of the Sears estate, and rented the Tremont House, owned by the Sears estate, 
and that the Tremont House has got a " rum-hole " in it, where young men 
are going to ruin. 

Q. Do you know the terms of that renting ? 

A. No, sir ; I know only by report. 

Q. Do you rely on common report as evidence in making a charge of this 
kind? 

A. Oh, yes ; if it is well enough grounded to believe it. 

Q. Do you know anything about the terms of that renting ? 

A. Well, yes; I know something about it. 

Q. What were they ? 

A. I know there was a little sort of a subterfuge in it about a nuisance, 
or something of that sort. 

Q. What did you know about a subterfuge at the time you preached that 
sermon ? 

A. I did not say that I knew there was a subterfuge at that time. 

Q. How did you know it ? 

A. I rather think I did know it at the time. 

Q. Hoav did you know it ? Had this lease been made a subject of inquiry 
or seen by anybody but the parties to it ? 

A. A friend of Mr. Hardy's, I think, told me something of the matter, 
having talked with Mr. Hardy about it. 

Q. Who is that friend ? 

A. I will tell, if I ought to tell. 



APPENDIX. 515 

Q. Are you willing to tell ? 

A. I would be very happy to tell after I get the consent of the gentleman ; 
I do not wish to tell without. 

Q. You are unwilling to tell ? Are you willing to state that any man ever 
told you so ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. Do you know ? 

A. Well, no ; I do not know. 

Q. Do you think it proper for a moral and Christian minister to make dis- 
reputable charges in his sermons against individuals, unless he absolutely 
knows the truth of that charge ? I want you to answer that question as to 
whether you think it is proper. 

A . I should not think it was ; no. 

Q. If you did not absolutely know the charge you made 

A. I did know the charge. 

Q. You did? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You knew that Mr. Hardy rented that bar-room for the purpose ot 
selling liquor, did you ? 

A. Of course the place was rented, in which there was rented a bar-room. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You knew that he rented a bar-room ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you not understand, when you made that charge, that that bar- 
room was rented for the purpose of selling liquor ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. You say that you knew that he rented the Tremont House, and rented 
that bar-room for the purpose of selling liquor, and that you had seen a letter 
referring to this matter ? 

A. It was a copy of a letter requesting me not to say anything hard about 
Mr. Hardy on the Sabbath. In this letter Mr. Hardy defended himself in the 
same way as in the other letter, saying that he was one of the trustees, and 
rented it in that way. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You knew it at that time — that is, so far as that 
letter went ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Why, then, did you not make the qualification ? 

A. I did not care how he rented it. 

Q. Was there anything said in that letter as to the terms of the renting ? 

A. I do not know that there was; I do not remember much about the 
letter. 

Q. How did you come to say, a few moments ago, then, that the idea of 
the letter was that he was one of the trustees, and rented the house in that 
way ? Do you now say that there was a subterfuge ? 
A. No, sir, I do not say that I knew of the subterfuge on Sunday. 

Q. At the time, then, that you preached that sermon, you did not know 
anything about the lease ? You did not then know anything about that 
subterfuge ? 

A. I do not know whether I did or not ; but I think I did. 



516 APPENDIX. 

Q. I would ask you, then, if, not knowing anything about the lease, nor of 
the contract, nor whether it was leased to exclude the sale of liquor or not, 
you regard it as proper to make a charge of that kind ? 

A. I do not think it is a proper supposition. I did know more than he 
supposed I did. I knew that he rented the Tremont House. I did not care 
anything about the terms, but simply the fact that it was rented by him. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) That is, you think that the mere renting of it is 
a fair ground for the assertion, independent of the terms ? 

A. The fact that the Tremont House is rented, and that there is a public 
bar-room rented there, is sufficient ground for me. 

Q. Independent of terms ? 

A. Independent of terms. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you mean that the putting them in was the 
design of Mr. Hardy ? 

A. I do not say that. 

Q. Do you say that it is a subterfuge there ? 

A. I stated that there was some sort of a subterfuge. I do not know 
whether he intended to put it in there or not ? 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You think that the great obstacle to the cause of 
temperance is the drinking usages of a certain class in society ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I want to ask you another thing. You denounce very strongly. Do 
you believe that the free use of liquors is a sin ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Per se ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you believe that the free use of intoxicating liquors, those which 
are embraced among intoxicating liquors and are declared to be intoxicating 
by the law of Massachusetts, is a sin per se ? 

A . To be used as a beverage ? Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) What do you mean by beverage, the occasional 
taking of it, or the usual and constant use of it ? 

A. I take either. 

Q. Then a single glass of wine, or cider, or anything prohibited by the 
law, you would consider a sin ? 

A. I would. 

Q. Do you believe that it is wrong, and a sin per se, to drink a glass of 
cider, under any circumstances, as a beverage ? 

A. I do not know whether I do or not. I have never really got down to 
that. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are in higher spheres ? 

A . In higher spheres ; yes, sir. 

Q. Do you believe that the free sale of intoxicating liquors is a sin ? 

A . Well, I think in that I should go against some of my friends. Yes, sir, 
I rather think it is. 

Q. For any purpose ? 

A . Well, I know very well that there are those who think differently. I 
do not myself think it is necessary for anything. 



APPENDIX. 517 

Q. Do you believe that the Saviour of the world, by his omniscience, 
knew everything that would happen to the end of time, and in all states and 
conditions ? 

A. I do most assuredly. 

Q. Do you believe that, knowing what would be the state of society, the 
temptations and everything to which mankind would be exposed, that Christ 
would have instituted wine as a memorial — that he would have instituted an 
article, to be kept before the community all the time, which ought to be 
outlawed ? 

A. I think that if we go into that question, we should have to go back 
and see what he did institute. 

Q. I refer to wine. 

A. The wine used at the Passover was not fermented liquor; it was simply 
pressed from the grape. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Do you not think that the wine spoken of in the 
New Testament was the same wine as that used at the feast of the Passover ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Was there any difference in the words used to designate the article of 
wine? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you tell us what it was ? 

A. I do not believe I could. If I had supposed that I was going into that 
I would have brought the words here. I know the argument very well ; and 
I do not believe that it is at all such wine as we have. 

Q. When it speaks of a man who uses wine excessively as being a 
gluttonous man and a wine-bibber, is it not the same word used ? 

A. My impression is that it is not ? 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What do you understand to be the kind of wine 
alluded to when we are told to give wine to those that are faint, and strong 
drink to those who are ready to perish ? What kind of wine was that ? 

A. The strong drink probably was not the same. 

Q. Then, do I understand you to believe that there is any hope of pro- 
moting the temperance reform, by taking ground that is contrary to the 
conviction and feelings of a large portion of the Christian church of all 
denominations ? 

A. I know there is. 

Q. This is the only way to carry it ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. Then in regard to the use of wine at the sacrament, you would go 
against it ? 

A. Yes, sir. I mean the same kind of wine that you mean. And I think 
that the most respectable part of the people think about as I do about this 
one question. 

Q. Do they practice that opinion ? 

A . No, sir ; they find it very difficult to get other wine, and they let it go ; 
but I think they feel the other way. 



518 APPENDIX. 

Testimony of Rev. J. M. Manning. 
Q. (By mS Miner.) You have been a resident of Boston for how many 

^r It is now ten years this present week since I became a resident of 

Boston. 

Q. You are the associate pastor of the Old South Church i 

A. I preach at the Old South Church. 

Q And alternate with the senior pastor in the Chambers Street Chapel I 

A. He preaches in the same church. There is also another pastor who 
preaches in the same church with me. 

Q. Have you given special. attention to the question of temperance i 

A. I have not made it a speciality. 

Q. Has it or has it not enlisted your interest ? 

A It has. 

Q. For how many years have you been an observer of the facts connected 

with the temperance reform ? ... 

A. The subject has grown up in connection with my ministry. 
Q. Have you felt yourself able to eliminate from the Christian work all 
temperance effort? 
A ~$o sir. 

Q. State, in your own way, your opinions in regard to the condition of the 
cause, and particularly with regard to the question here at issue concernmg 
the policy of prohibition ? . 

A I have not seen a draft of the petition for a license law. I read in 
the papers (but do not know of my own knowledge whether it is true or not,) 
that the petitioners for the license law have defined their position more 
recently and are not petitioning for what it was supposed that they were 
petitioning for. So that I cannot say how much I should be opposed to the 
petition until I had read it. I suppose, however, that the petitioners ask at 
least for this, that persons may be licensed to deal in intoxicating drinks as a 
private business and for the purpose of making money. 

Q They ask that hotel-keepers and victuallers and some others, may have 
license to sell as a beverage, and that all restrictions upon the sale of beer 
cider and wine may be removed, and that all restrictions over the licensed 
dealer may be removed. 

A I should not be in favor of granting that petition, but I may say here, 
that supposing those objects at least to be contemplated in the petition, I 
signed a remonstrance with other ministers of this city and vicinity against 
the o-ranting of the petition, and in signing that remonstrance I did not think 
I was actuated by any vindictive spirit, nor by any desire to interfere with any 
man's honorable private business. I think that I have as much desire for the 
material prosperity of the City of Boston, in all respects, as any other man. 
I claim at least to be second to none in what is usually called " public spirit, 
and furthermore, I have no vindictive feeling towards those who are at present 
eno-ao-ed in the sale of intoxicating liquors. I can understand, I think, very 
well & how many hotel-keepers, who mean to do an honorable business, have 
been gradually drawn into this sale, but I suspect that they, themselves, would 
be glad if they could keep hotels and make it a paying business - if they 



APPENDIX. 519 

could meet, what seems to them to be, the wants of their customers — I suspect 
that they, themselves, would enjoy more peace of mind if they could get along 
without selling intoxicating liquors. I am not one of those who never go to 
the Parker House or Young's Hotel for a dinner. I have often dined there and 
am generally well served, although I think that I have noticed that some per- 
son near me, who had ordered his wine, received a little more prompt attend- 
ance than I did ; but still I did not allow that to prejudice me at all against 
the hotel-keeper. I have no doubt those keepers of hotels when they take 
the money out of their drawers at night, would feel better in counting that 
money, if they could look at it and feel the assurance that no noble woman 
and no dependent children had been made to suffer from the outrages of a 
drunken father and husband, on account of that which they gave in exchange 
for the money. I think if they could do that, they would go to bed Saturday 
night and sleep more soundly. It seems to me that if the keepers of our 
public houses could once understand that this is the sentiment of the people 
of the Commonwealth, and if the temperance people would nobly sustain them 
in their efforts to keep public houses without selling intoxicating drinks, and 
exercise towards them, not a spirit of vindictiveness, but a manly spirit of love 
and good-will, that much might be done in that way to counteract the opposition 
of the liquor-dealers to what is called the prohibitory law. I believe the 
statute does not call it by that name, for it does not, as I understand, abso- 
lutely prohibit the use of intoxicating drinks. I am opposed to licensing 
private dealers — common dealers — because it seems to me that it is subjecting 
those dealers to a most powerful temptation. I do not believe that it is a sin 
per se, to drink a glass of wine. I believe that an invalid may drink when a wise 
physician prescribes it, and therefore it is not a sin under all circumstances to 
sell it ; but the common dealer is exposed to a very powerful temptation. I 
presume there are men in Massachusetts who could be trusted to sell intoxica- 
ting drinks, when they know that all the profits of their business depend upon 
the amount of their sales ; but such men are few. The temptation is a 
strong one. I suspect that those men who would be trustworthy in such a 
business, are not the men who would ask for licenses. I should not like to see 
a friend of mine, no matter how strong in moral principle, or how firmly 
guarded by his love for justice and for his fellow-men he might be, — I should 
not like to see him exposed to such temptation. I believe that under such 
circumstances and by such a person, the selling of intoxicating liquor would 
be immoral and a sin ; but inasmuch as we must have liquor for medicinal, 
mechanical and chemical purposes, it seems to me that the Commonwealth, 
itself, should be the liquor-seller, — that that power which represents the tax- 
payers who have to bear the burden of all the crime and pauperism 
which result from the sale of intoxicating liquors, should be the seller. And, 
as I think it will be a proud day for Massachusetts when we can say, that in 
the State of Massachusetts there is but one liquor-seller, and that liquor-seller 
is the Governor of the Commonwealth ; that it is a dangerous business, a per- 
ilous business, and we intrust only our highest civil functionary with it. The 
question as to whether the prohibitory liquor law has proved a failure or not, 
I am not, perhaps, sufficiently conversant with the facts to answer, but it 
seems to me, from what I have already said, that the present law, if we have 



520 APPENDIX. 

the proper officers to execute it, is adapted to accomplish the object for which 
it was enacted. The amount of intemperance in this city and in various 
other places, may have increased since the prohibitory liquor law, as it is 
called, was passed, but I do not infer from that that the liquor law itself has 
been the occasion of that increase. There may have been an absolute increase 
and not a relative increase ; that is, the population has increased, and it is my 
impression, from conversation with various gentlemen, not so much from per- 
sonal acquaintance with the individual facts and cases, that there would be 
more intemperance to-day were it not for the influence of the prohibitory law. 
I think we can account for the increase of intemperance upon other grounds. 
The mind of the United States has been overstrained during the last four 
years. From this great excitement there is naturally a reaction, and the 
people are more strongly tempted to indulge in stimulants than formerly. 
Then, again, the apparent increase of wealth through the inflation of the 
currency of the country, has produced an unhealthy state of feeling in the 
community, which is a natural excitement to the use of stimulants. It does 
not seem to me that the prohibitory law has made those who believe in moral 
suasion (and I believe most firmly in it) less faithful. I believe that before 
the prohibitory law was passed, some of the congregations used to complain 
because the ministers used moral suasion. Now that we have this law, the 
complaint is that they are depending upon the law and have ceased moral 
suasion. I trust that we who are the ministers, will learn the lesson which 
this charge contains, and if we have been remiss, that we will be more faithful 
hereafter in urging the duty of temperance upon our congregations. 

Q. Have you not found pretty much the same class of persons all along 
through the history of the temperance movement, objecting to whatever 
measure was then in vogue ? 

A. I should say, yes, sir. I have found that to be true during my minis- 
try. The prohibitory law had been enacted when I became a resident of this 
city, although in my boyhood and childhood I knew somewhat of the license 
law, but the present law was on the statute books when I came to the city, 
and being naturally a conservative man, I was in favor of upholding the 
present state of things. 

Q. You alluded to the hypothetical increase of intemperance. Do you 
think that, judging from your own observation, you are warranted in saying 
that intemperance has increased ? 

A. No, sir. My observation would be insufficient to warrant me in 
making such a statement. 

Q. So far as you can compare the present with ten years ago, would you 
say that you observe more or less inebriety ? 

A. I think I can say confidently that I observe less. There is less public 
drunkenness, less visible drunkenness, than there was ten years ago. 

Q. So far as the social circles in which you move are concerned, do you 
feel that there is there any iucrease in the moderate use of liquor ? 

A . No, sir. I am very happy to say that in the circles in which I move I 
think the tendency has been the opposite, owing, I suppose, to the public sen- 
timent created in those circles ; and I attribute that public sentiment in part, 
to the influence of this law. 



APPENDIX. 521 

Q. Have you observed any detriment in or from the law to the use of 
moral efforts — is there anything in the existing law that will debar moral 
effort ? 

A. There is nothing in it that bars moral effort. I do not suppose that 
any law prohibiting any act ought to make us less faithful in our efforts to 
produce a public sentiment which will prevent the act itself, if the act be in 
our judgment wrong and contrary to the spirit of Christianity. For instance, 
we do not make the law against theft an excuse for hot teaching our children 
that they should not steal. 

Q. What class of temperance men have been most active in the use of 
moral means, those who uphold the prohibitory law or those who oppose it ? 

A. I think that some of those gentlemen whose names appear as petition- 
ers or as witnesses in favor of this license law, I think that some of those gentle- 
men mean to be just as true temperance men as I mean to be ; and I think 
that some of them have been faithful in using moral means for the suppression 
of intemperance. I am not able to answer your question definitely, but I 
can give only my general impression. I go about the Commonwealth some- 
what. I have met many different public audiences during the past six 
months and have conversed with many gentlemen, and it is my experience 
that those who are most active in promoting temperance are opposed to the 
enactment of a license law. 

Q. Do you think it possible for men who are known to be habitual users 
of intoxicating beverages in any form, to exert in favor of total abstinence 
that degree of influence that a total abstainer can ? 

A. I think the old adage, that our actions preach louder than our words, 
holds true here. 

Q. Would you feel if you had a class of young persons under your 
immediate personal influence, at liberty to use any alcoholic beverages, and 
thus place such an example before them ? 

A. Certainly not while I professed to be a follower of Christ. 

Q. Do you feel clear in the position that such an example is wrong and 
sinful, although the acceptance of a glass of wine under other circumstances 
might not be sinful ? 

A . I suppose that there are very few external acts that are sins in them- 
selves. The sin depends upon the motive. If a man drinks liquor to save 
his life, or if I should find a man at the point of death and put the bottle to 
his lips, I do not suppose that the act would be a sin. 

Q. So that it is out of the social relations that men bear, that the character 
of their conduct is made to follow ? 

A. Yes, sir. I believe that many persons who use wine habitually at their 
tables are conscientious Christian men, and I have often argued this question 
with such persons in a friendly way, and I always take the ground which 
seems to me to be the ground of the Scriptures upon this subject. I do not 
wish to be understood as saying that I think that anybody who drinks a glass 
of wine socially, commits a sin against God ; but I think that I should be 
committing a sin to do it. 

Q. You would leave that question to be decided by the measure of light 
and conviction of the individual himself ? 



522 APPENDIX. 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Would that fact, although he excuses himself, prevent his example or 
influence from being bad ? 

A. Not at all. There is an old saying that a blunder is sometimes worse 
than a crime, and a man may by mistake or through ignorance do that which 
shall cause a great amount of injury. 

Q. Do you think that the Commonwealth, in considering the expediency 
or the duty devolving upon it in this great social emergency, under any obli- 
gation to lower its standard of principle to the level of the consciences of such 
men as you have referred to ? 

A. I should be very sorry to see the Commonwealth depart from what I 
consider to be its present policy upon this question. 

Q. What do you think to be the duty of the State, to place its standard 
of effort and especially its principles as embodied in law, upon a level 
with the best minds of the State, or upon the level of the lower habits and 
practices of the people of the State ? 

A. I think that the law should be an elevating power. I consider the law 
to be one of the educators of human society. 

Q. Do you feel that there is any considerable force in the assumption, that 
if a law is disobeyed, it should be repealed ? 

A. No, sir ; when the supreme law of our land was violated, we sent our 
army to conquer the violators. We did not change the law, because we be- 
lieved the law to be in principle what it ought to be. So it is in regard to 
this law. 

Q. Would you think it the duty of the civil authorities to repeal this law 
because it is disobeyed, or should they use their influence to execute the law ? 

A. I think that the law can be executed a great deal more easily 
than even its friends suppose. If the liquor-dealers once find that they can 
keep good hotels without furnishing intoxicating drinks, — that public senti- 
ment does not demand it, — we shall not have so great opposition in the 
enforcement of the law. 

Q. Do you see any indications that the laAv is likely to be better executed ? 

A. My duties are of such a nature, that I do not come in personal contact 
with the facts. I read all that reaches me through the public press, and I 
converse with gentlemen who are interested in the law, and my impression is, 
that there is an advance in the direction of which you speak. 

Q. What, so far as you know, is the general feeling of the ministers of 
your church in regard to this law ? 

A . It is overwhelmingly in favor of the law. 

Q. And in favor of maintaining the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. Something has been said about the weight of mind being in 
opposition to this law ; I think, perhaps, some of that may be dead weight. 

Q. The attempt has been here made to sway the legislation of the Com- 
monwealth by the weight of individual names ; do you know of a single live 
man of your church who is opposed to this prohibitory law ? 

A. I know of men, for whom I have the greatest respect, who oppose this 
law, — men whom I believe mean to be true to their calling, and far be it from 
me to call their motives in question. Still I feel that they are mistaken. 



APPENDIX. 523 

Q. Granting all that, are they men in whom the hopes of the church 
centre to any considerable extent ? 

A . The hopes of the church will not centre- in them for a great while to 
come, if they do not change their base. I have read the testimony that has 
been offered here, and I know that those gentlemen who have testified in 
favor of a license law, are thorough- going total abstinence men in practice. 
I make this remark, because I wish to say nothing in the course of my remarks 
that should seem to impugn the motives of such men, and if I should do so, 
it would be unintentional. I believe that generally they mean to be as true 
as I mean to be ; but I believe that in this matter they are mistaken, and that 
they will yet see their mistake. I have intimations — nothing positive — but I 
have received intimations that some of them have already been led to doubt 
the correctness of their position. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are not wedded, I suppose, to any particular 
form of law, but only in favor of that which shall most efficiently promote 
the cause of temperance ? 

A. I think that my predominant desire is to see the people temperate. 

Q. I suppose, then, you have no preference as to the legal means 
employed ? 

A. I do not think that I should be in favor of a military law. 

Q. I am speaking now of civil law. You are not wedded to any par- 
ticular policy of legislation ? 

A. Anything that is reasonable and efficient. 

Q. The question, then, in your mind is, whether the law now upon the 
statute book, with such modifications as are proposed by the petitioners, 
would be the most efficient means of promoting temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Your opinion is that the present law might be made the most 
efficient ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I suppose that you do not doubt the sincerity of gentlemen who 
entertain different opinions ? 

A. I do not doubt their sincerity. 

Q. Now, in ascertaining whether you are mistaken in your opinion, or 
they in theirs, we must investigate the facts in regard to the operation of the 
present law, must we not ? 

A. It depends partly upon that. 

Q. Does it not depend altogether upon that ? 

A. If, by facts, you include the nature of the law itself, it does. There is 
in every law, I suppose, a sort of self-evidencing authority. We judge before- 
hand of a law that it is fit to do the work intended. 

Q. But the ability to say which of the two policies would be best 
promotive of temperance would depend, would it not, upon an examination 
of a great many facts as to the comparative efficiency of the two policies in 
this country and in other countries ? 

A . Not altogether upon an examination of the facts. I would not go to 
Europe to learn how to govern Massachusetts. A great many things have 
failed in Sweden and in Scotland, and in other countries of Europe, which 



524 APPENDIX. 

you and I know are succeeding very well in this country. I think that we 
should look at the results of the law that have been manifested in this 
country. To give the facts their proper weight, we should learn what results 
were due to the existence of the law itself, and what to other causes, inde- 
pendent of the law. 

Q. But the question is to be settled after all, not upon any theory or 
abstract principle, but by looking as far as we may be able to the real effect 
which a measure is calculated, in the judgment of men, to produce, rather 
than to what we may suppose to be the normal or legitimate tendency of the 
law ? Is not the legitimate tendency of a law to be judged of by its effects ? 

A . Not altogether by those effects to which you refer. 

Q. Is there anything else than the effects actually produced, by which 
practical legislators and practical men can judge of the tendency and value 
of a law ? Is not the legitimate tendency of a law chiefly to be determined 
by its effects ? 

A. I think that I have answered the question. I think that there is some- 
thing in a law itself which, prior to any investigation of its effects in 
individual cases, commends it to, or condemns it in our judgment. That 
a priori, or self-evidencing power of the law ought not to be rejected in our 
investigations as to the tendency and value of a law. 

Q. Would you not also take into consideration the probability of a law 
being executed for a good purpose ? 

A. The probabilty ? Certainly I would. This legitimate tendency of the 
law makes it probable that it will be executed. If we see a sharp axe, we 
judge beforehand that it is suited for cutting down a tree, if it is put into 
the hands of the right man. 

Q. Still, the axe may be used or it may not be used to cut down 
a tree ? 

A. It may be or it may not be ; but there is in the axe itself a fitness for 
that work. 

Q. Does not the effect produced by the axe depend entirely upon the use 
that is made of it ? And, if the the axe is blunt, will it produce the same 
effect? 

A. When the iron is blunt, it is necessary to put forth more strength. I 
prefer a sharp axe to a blunt one. 

Q. An axe may be well adapted to the cutting down of a tree, but still 
never cut one down ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Then this law may have in itself a tendency to prevent intemperance, 
but, if it be contrary to the best judgment of the people, will it have the 
legitimate effect to check that evil ? 

A. It may not have that effect if the right kind of men do not take hold 
of it and execute it. 

Q. Is there in the simple adaptation of this law anything to produce the 
force that is necessary to execute it ? 

A. We had, at the outbreak of the rebellion, arsenals filled with swords 
and muskets and bayonets, all of which were very nicely adapted to the put- 
ting down of this rebellion, but they had to be put into the hands of truly 



APPENDIX. 525 

loyal men before they did the work. I would not go back from the 
Springfield musket to the old Austrian musket, nor from the Parrott gun to 
the smooth bore. 

Q. If neither of them were ever to be used, you would not make them, 
would you ? 

A. I would make them ; yes, sir. 

Q. If they were never to be used ? 

A. That is not a question to be considered. They ought to be used, and 
will be. 

Q. You say that you do not think that it is a sin to drink spirits, or a 
glaf s of wine ? 

A. I explained the statement. 

Q. You said that you did not consider it a sin under certain circum- 
stances ? 

A. I believe that there are circumstances under which it is perfectly 
right. 

Q. In other words, it is not, under all circumstances, a sin to drink or sell ? 

A. I say that there are circumstances in which it is not a sin. 

Q. Would you then, think that a law which made such an act a crime, 
was right ? 

A. The law does not make it a crime to sell. The Governor may sell, 
and the law does not make it a crime for him to sell. 

Q. We all have more or less occasion to use spirits in our families; I 
suppose that you do ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I was floated in whiskey and brandy for six months. 



Q. Did you get the liquor at the State Agency 



A. No, sir. I was at that time in a state of delirium; the liquor was 
chiefly contributed from the cellars of private citizens of Boston, who were 
very kind to me during that sickness. 

Q. Do you not suppose that the purchase of that liquor exposed somebody 
to the house of correction ? 

A. I do not know, sir. ' 

Q. If it was bought at any of the liquor-stores of Boston, did it not ? 

A. I. suppose that if it was not bought of the State, the purchase was con- 
trary to the law of the State. I do not know how it was obtained. I do not 
know but there may be ways of obtaining it other than from the State Agent, 
which may not be illegal. 

Q. Have you in any instance, gone to the State Agency in Boston to buy 
any liquor ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you use any, other than that you have mentioned ? 

A. I will say frankly, that I use wine as a medicine whenever a wise 
physician says that I must use it. 

Q. Do you get the wine, that he directs you to use, at the State Agency ? 

A. I dare not get it at the State Agency, because I am afraid of its being 
poisonous. 



526 APPENDIX. 

Q. Then unless you get twenty-eight gallons at a time, the person who 
sells it to you exposes himself to the punishment of going to the House of 
Correction. 

A. Then I suppose that I am also a criminal, and stand before you, 
to-day, as a criminal. 

Q. Do you think the law that makes you a criminal, a wise one ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you feel, in your own conscience, that you are a criminal ? 

A. I feel that I am not a criminal in the sight of God. When the pro- 
hibitory law is administered according to the designs of those who passed it, 
when we have State Agents whom we can trust, when importers and liquor- 
dealers will sell pure wine to the agencies, and not take advantage of them, 
as I understand they do, when importers will cease to take advantage of the 
fact that these men are State Agents to sell them impure liquors just to bring 
the law into disrepute, then when at the point of death we may not be 
compelled to break the law for the sake of saving our lives. 

Q. What do you think of the law that requires you or somebody else to 
expose himself to the House of Correction, for the sake of saving your life ? 

A. It is not the law that requires it. 

Q. What do you think of the expediency of such a law ? 

A. If I knew of such a law, I should consider it very inexpedient. These 
results have not been the legitimate tendency of the law, but result from the 
opposition of men to the law, — of men who have been trying to bring the 
law into disrepute. 

Q. Should not every wise legislator, in the enactment of any law, consider 
the fact whether or not the law can be enforced ? 

A. I think not. I think that it would be very difficult, in Utah, to exe- 
cute the law against polygamy, yet I should be in favor of having such a 
law. 

Q. If the law we have does not produce the desired effect, and another 
would be more efficient, though, perhaps, it might not be your ideal of a law, 
would it not be better to give up a little of your abstract theory, and have 
the law that would be the most efficient ? 

A. I would go for the perfect law. If the perfect law will not restrain 
the evil, certainly an imperfect law will not. 

Q. When Moses made a law granting divorces, which was contrary to the 
law from the beginning — given under inspiration, if you please — did he do 
wrong ? 

A. There were many things in the Hebrew economy which are not 
examples for the Christian Church to follow. Slavery, in a certain form, and 
polygamy, in a certain form, then existed. The Mosaic economy was pecu- 
liar to a people, who were yet to be educated and fitted for the Christian 
Church. 

Q. Do you or not believe that it is proper to have reference to the fact, 
whether or not a law can be executed, when you are enacting that law ? 

A. I do, sir; and I believe that those laws can, in the long run, be most 
readily executed which beforehand commend themselves to the moral sense 
of men as right and just. I am not a legislator ; I am not a statesman ; but a 



APPENDIX. 527 

moralist. Perhaps persons who are familiar with legislation could answer 
such a question better than I could; certainly they ought to be able to give 
an opinion which would be worth more than mine. 

Q. Is there not something besides the law needful to prepare the people to 
obey it, and must not that preparation be made before the enactment of the 
law? 

A. Undoubtedly. There must be a moral sense in men, and a certain 
amount of moral suasion, perhaps, used in advance ; and, above all, there 
must be a determination, on the part of those who are charged with the exe- 
cution of the law, that it shall be executed. 

Q. Must there not be a moral sense in the community, and a pretty 
decided one, before stringent criminal laws can be executed with any 
effect ? 

A. I think there must be a very decided moral sentiment with regard to 
this prohibitory law before it will be executed without making trouble in the 
Commonwealth — before people will obey it readily. 

Q. If that moral sense be wanting, will the law be effective for any 
good ? 

A. Well, sir, in the case which we are to consider, I do not understand 
that the moral sense is wanting ; and, therefore, we are not to consider a 
case where the moral sense is wanting. In this case, which we are to consider, 
it seems to me that the law is practically perfect. 

Q. That is a question of fact ; I am testing a principle, upon your basis 
as a moralist. I am testing the question whether, if there be not such a moral 
sense as will execute the law, the law can be effective for good ? 

A. Well, sir, I have been accustomed to preach the absolute morality. I 
believe Christ preached it, and he is my Master. And so far as my short 
experience is any guide to me, the man who takes that ground in the begin- 
ning, and who does not allow himself to be pulled away from it by surround- 
ing influences, but stands right there all his life, will bring men round to him, 
and will accomplish a great deal more in educating them, elevating them, 
and securing their confidence and respect, in the long run, than if he allows 
himself to be pulled away from that standard of absolute morality, and 
begins by revolving these questions in his mind — " "What is expedient ? what 
is practicable ? " and says, " All this is very well, but it is visionary ; we 
must be practical men." I have never taken that ground, and I am not 
prepared to yet. I took the stand where it seemed to me my Master stood, 
and by His grace I hope to be able to stand there as long as I stand anywhere. 

Q. As a moral and religious teacher, you take that to be your duty, and I 
do not object to it at all ; but when you come to legislate, you have got to 
legislate for immediate effect upon communities and people as they are ? 

A. Well, sir, I shall not quarrel with statesmen and legislators until I see 
the laws which they have passed, as it seems to me, producing a bad moral 
effect in the community ; and when I see a law already existing which com- 
mends itself to my reason as adapted to produce a wholesome moral influence 
in the community, I shall stand by it. 

Q. Unless you find that in its operation it does wrong ? If it does wrong, 
you would not stand by it ? 



528 APPENDIX. 

A -. No, sir ; not if it does wrong through any fault in itself ? 

Q. Suppose it does wrong by the means which are taken to execute it ? 

A. If one agent does not make a good use of the instrumentality, we 
must find another who will. 

Q. Does the execution of criminal laws, the infliction of fines and imprison- 
ment, have any tendency, in your opinion, to produce that moral change 
which is necessary, as you believe, to effect a reformation in any man ?. 

A. It may not always produce any moral change for the better in that 
man, but its existence is a great educating power in the community. 

Q. Does it have any effect on that man ? 

A. It may not on him. It would have a different effect, probably, in 
different cases. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You know that license laws have been in exist- 
ence in this country for one hundred and fifty years, do you not ? 

A. If you say they have been, I will believe it. 

Q. Did you ever hear of any license law doing anything to restrain the 
traffic in intoxicating drinks ? 

A . My general impression has been, that a license law does not do any- 
thing to restrain the traffic. And I have this feeling, also, in regard to 
licenses. It seems to me to be a little unfair to make business men a State 
police. There are officers to do the governing, and private individuals to do 
the business. 

Q. About what time did you receive your impression against the State 
Agency ? Have you heard much of it of late years ? 

A. I remarked that I had heard that there had been a reform in that 
respect ; and it is my intention, before purchasing any more liquors, to make 
a trial of the liquor which is sold by the State Agent. I intend to buy a 
bottle at the State Agency and have it analyzed, and if it is pure, I shall 
thank God and take courage. 

Q. Should you feel more sure of getting a pure article by going to the 
ordinary sellers of liquor ? 

A. No, sir. Something besides the question of pure liquors comes in 
there. 

Testimony of Eev. Stedman W. Hanks. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Lowell. My office is in Boston. 

Q. You are District Secretary of the American Seaman's Friend Society, 
are you not ? 

A. Yes, sir; that is my business. My work is to keep their cause before 
the churches of the Commonwealth, and of course I am in the country most 
of the time ; spend all my Sabbaths there. 

Q. You travel about the country very extensively ? 

A. Yes, sir. For thirteen years I have been in that business, " going to 
fro in the earth." 

Q. You are very well acquainted with clergymen ? 

A. Yes, sir. Of the five hundred and thirty clergymen belonging to the 
denomination with which I am connected, I find that I am personally 



APPENDIX. 529 

acquainted with four hundred, at least. That includes the professors in the 
various institutions of my own denomination. 

Q. Of the four hundred with whom you are acquainted, how many are in 
favor of a license law in preference to a prohibitory law ? 

A. From the best estimate I can make about the matter, I should say, not 
more than one in forty or fifty. Three are in the city of Boston ; I know of 
three more in the rural districts with whom I have conversed ; and there are 
are one or two more of whom I should say, from what I have heard of them, 
that they are in favor a license law. But, so far as I know, I should say 
that forty-nine out of fifty clergymen are not in favor of a license law, but of 
a prohibitory law. 

Q. You mean the clergymen of your denomination ? 
A. Yes, sir. And so far as the clergymen of the Methodist denomination 
are concerned, of whom I know a great many, I do not know of any who 
favor a license law. They all hold to the doctrine of good old John 
Wesley, that this is a pretty bad business. 

Q. (By the Chairman.) What is your denomination ? 
A. Orthodox Congregationalism 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How extensively is the law executed ? 
A. I should say, that outside of Boston and the other cities, it was pretty 
generally executed, so far as the open sale is concerned. I do not hear of 
very many liquor-shops in the country towns. I have had occasion to make 
inquiries about the matter, and I find that in most cases outside the cities, the 
sale is carried on in a covert, secret way, and that the old liquor-selling 
establishments are closed, as places of business. 

Q. Do you observe any improvement in the cities in this respect lately ? 
A. I should think that since the State Constables have been at work in the 
cities, there has been a decrease in the sale, but I cannot speak so confidently 
about that. I should think there were less places carrying on this business 
since that method of enforcing the law was commenced. 

Q. What is the principal obstacle to the enforcement of the present law ? 
A. I have the impression that the great obstacle in the way of its enforce- 
ment is the fact, that there are so many men of standing and influence in the 
community who prophesy evil about this matter, who say the law cannot be 
executed ; and I am sorry to say, that a good many of them in their social 
parties drink wine, and set an example which is wrong. I think if they 
would take the same ground that was taken by Franklin Pierce when the 
Fugitive Slave Law was passed, " The law must be executed," it would be. 
Let the ground be taken that our Governor took when the war broke out, 
" Put down the rebellion ! It must be done ! " and this traffic would be put 
down very quickly, I am confident. And I want to add, that I regard a 
remark made here by a distinguished physician, namely, that he did not regret 
the drinking usages of the community, as one of the greatest obstacles 
conceivable to the execution of this law. 

Q. What proportion of the practical friends of temperance, the members 
of temperance societies, &c, and the members of churches, in your opinion, 
are in favor of a license law, as compared with a prohibitory law ? 
67 



530 APPENDIX. 

A. I find two kinds of friends of temperance, very distinctly defined. One 
class is the conservative class ; the other is the radical class. The conserva- 
tive class go pretty strongly for license ; they do not attend temperance 
meetings much, and take occasionally a glass of liquor, thinking it, on the 
whole, not very bad. That class of " friends " are, for the most part, in favor 
of license. The other class, the cold-water temperance people, the total- 
abstainers, so far as I know, all through the community where I have been, 
are in favor of the present law, and of the execution of that law. 

Q. Was the law executed at Lowell at any time ? 

A. I was a resident of Lowell at the time of the passage of the law, and 
had some particular reasons for watching that thing, as it was predicted that 
the law would be a failure. I went into some of the principal streets, the very 
night after the law went into execution, to see whether the shops were open, 
and I found them almost universally closed up. I went up and down the 
streets several times on purpose to observe the matter, and saw that the shops 
were closed up ; and on the doors of some of them there was a piece of black 
crape ; and some had this inscription, which pleased me considerably : 
" Spirits departed ! " The liquor business was closed up at that time for a 
short period. Dr. Miner was a resident of Lowell at that time, and he can 
bear testimony to this fact. 

Q. Do you think the non-execution of the law in Boston had any influence 
in Lowell ? 

A. The moment it was announced that the law was not executed in 
Boston, the liquor-sellers opened there shops again, the " spirits " came back, 
and the business went on. 

Q. Do you think the authorities of Boston ever made a serious effort to 
enforce the law ? 

A. It never seemed to me so. It seemed to me that the policy of the 
Boston police, excellent men as they were, was to get over this matter as 
easily as they could, and to let these criminals go. That has been the result 
of my observation. I have not been a resident of Boston. I come to the city 
in the morning, and return in the evening. 

Q. What do you think of the morality of selling intoxicating drinks as a 
beverage ? 

A. I think it is a wicked practice ; it is a sin in every case. And yet I 
do not hold to the theory that it is wicked in all cases to drink intoxicating 
liquor, or to sell it. The cases seem to me very easily distinguishable, on the 
old principle settled by moral philosophers, namely, that the motive is to be 
considered. When, for instance, a professor of surgery goes to the Massa- 
chusetts Hospital and cuts off a man's leg, or both of his legs, or removes a 
tumor, it looks like a very butchering business; yet we do not call that 
wicked. But, if another professor operates upon a man as Prof. Webster did 
upon Dr. Parkman, and cuts his body up into fragments, it is a very different 
matter. Men are to be judged by their motives. The transactions are very 
much alike, but the judgment of the community upon the actors is very 
different : one is to be commended ; the other to be hanged. 

Q. Do you think the prohibitory law has helped the cause of tem- 
perance ? 



APPENDIX. 531 

A. I have the impression decidedly that it has helped it in this way: It 
has closed up a vast many places where intoxicating liquors were sold in the 
rural districts. I have been to nearly every town in the Commonwealth, and 
have put the question to numerous clergymen, and it is their testimony and 
the testimony of many persons in the rural districts, that the law has been 
an essential help in closing up these places. 

Q. Do you not think the law does considerable in educating the com- 
munity, and making them think it wrong to sell or drink intoxicating 
liquors ? 

A. Certainly. I have the impression that this law has a vast influence in 
the community, considered as an educator ; that it puts this matter on the right 
basis, — that it is a thing which fills the prisons and almshouses, — and there- 
fore is very useful in its educational influence upon the community. 

Q. If the law licenses a thing, is it not a necessary consequence that it 
thereby says it is proper to be done, and has a tendency to bring the public 
sentiment to that conclusion ? 

A. It seems to me that it must have that tendency. It would be a very 
sad thing for the community to have that idea inculcated in that way. 

Q. We have heard a great deal about the increase of intemperance. How 
is it now, according to your observation, as compared with two or three years 
ago? 

A. Compared with two or three years ago, I should not speak very con- 
fidently. For two or three years the temperance cause, until the last year, 
perhaps, has been somewhat at a stand. Within the last year or two, I think 
the cause has made great progress ; but looking back ten years, and more par- 
ticularly, twenty years, it seems to me that in the rural districts, the change 
has been perfectly enormous to anybody who will be candid. The sale of 
liquor at the grocery shops is stopped. In my own town, where I have been 
bookkeeper in two liquor-selling establishments, and knew every family in the 
place when I was there, the change is very marked. I can tell by the num- 
ber of rags and old hats stuck in the windows, and the number of persons in 
the poor-house and prison. The change is very easily perceptible to anybody 
who goes through these places with his eyes open. 

Q. Did you ever know a license law, from your observation, or anything 
you have heard, that did anything to restrain the traffic ? 

A. I have some knowledge in regard to the old license law passed about 
1835 or '36. That law was in existence when I was at college, and I had an 
opportunity to observe its operation, because I belonged to a temperance asso- 
ciation, and we watched it. In that place, there was a license given to an 
apothecary, who appeared before the committee and stated his reason for 
wanting a license. He said that he had $1,200 worth of liquors, and wanted 
a license in order that he might dispose of his liquor, otherwise he would meet 
with pecuniary loss. They granted it. He was a very good sort of a man, 
and probably intended to do his duty. Liquor was freely sold in that place. 
That license passed into the hands of another man, who was a strong temper- 
ance man when he took it ; he became a drunkard, had delirium tremens, 
walked into the river, and was drowned. It passed into the hands of another 
man, a member of the church. He broke down in character, made the 



532 APPENDIX. 

church a great deal of trouble ; the license was taken from him, and he went 
on selling liquor without a license. That is a case which I call to mind 
which I investigated at the time, and re-investigated in the very place, calling 
upon some of the old inhabitants to give me the facts about it. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You regard the public sentiment that is entertained 
by at least a part of the community, — the higher class, or the class that use 
their wine, etc., — as an obstacle to the enforcement of this law ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think it is a very great obstacle. 

Q. How do you propose to remove that obstacle, or change that public 
sentiment ? 

A. I propose to do what I can in the way of love and persuasion, and the 
rest by law. 

Q. Have you seen, within the last ten or fifteen years, any effect produced 
upon that class of men both by law and love ? 

A. I think they are something like the boy in the tree stealing apples. 
We have been throwing turf at them, and if they are still disposed to sell 
liquor, I think the constable should throw stones, and bring them down in 
that way. 

Q. I understood you to say that those persons who occasionally drink 
liquor and furnish it at parties were the great obstacles ? 

A. Yes, sir; I said so. That is my impression. 

Q. How do you propose to change the opinion of these men ? 

A, I propose to show them the bad influence of that, and I propose to 
have the law so thoroughly executed that they will be under the necessity of 
getting their liquor at the agency, and complying with the requirements of the 
law. 

Q. Do you think there has been any change, for the last ten or twelve 
years, in the sentiment of that class of people towards the prohibitory law, 
or in regard to the use of liquor ? 

A. I am very much afraid that that class of people have not been affected 
by the law or by moral suasion. I am afraid that some of them will come to 
the drunkard's terrible end, notwithstanding they occupy high positions. 

Q. There .has been no perceptible effect, by the instrumentalities of both 
love and law, on that class of men, so far as you know ? 

A. So far as I know, I do not think they have been very much restrained. 

Q. What is your observation in regard to the use of liquors by that class 
of men during the last fifteen or sixteen years ? Is it greater than it was in 
1840, '41, % '3, 'A , and '5 .? 

A . I am not able to say about that. 

Q. Are there not more families who now use it as a beverage, and furnish 
it to friends occasionally, within the sphere of your acquaintance, than fifteen 
or twenty years ago ? 

A. According to my observation, I should say not. I should say, from my 
observation in families where I visit, and at parties, that the state of things is 
very different from what it was. 

Q. Do you see much of the class of persons to whom you allude, to know 
their private habits ? 



APPENDIX. 533 

A. No, sir. I do not know about their private habits. I think very 
likely that when I visit them, they do not use the wine quite so much as they 
might in other cases. I do not drink it myself. 
Q. That you say is the great obstacle ? 

A. One great obstacle. 

Q. Is it not the greatest, in your opinion, to the realization of what you 
and all temperance men, I have no doubt, desire ? 

A. I should hardly be able to make the comparison. I should say it was 
a very great obstacle, but that there are other very great obstacles. 

Q. Do you see anything in the present instrumentalities that tends to 
change that sentiment and practice much among that class of people ? 

A. Only so far as truth is being spread. Their children are being edu- 
cated, and information circulated in the community in regard to the terrible 
consequences of the use of liquor. 

Q. Do you get many of the children of these families to sign the cold- 
water pledge ? 

A . A great many of them. That is regarded as a very important matter 
in these families. They generally say to their children, " You had better 
sign the pledge " — or many of them do so. 

Q. You do not think their preaching is very effective, do you ? 

A . Not so effective as it would be if they dispensed with their liquors. 

Q. Is there not an obstacle to the enforcement of this law resulting from 
this fact ; that, while the law makes it a house-of-correction offence to sell, it 
makes it no offence to buy or drink ? 

A. Well, it always seemed to me a very difficult thing to make a law 
about what people should eat or drink. There is a law against selling tainted 
meat, but there is no law against eating it, and any man can have a full 
dinner of that sort of meat if he chooses, and the law cannot touch him, 
because he is in his own domicile. That is the view I take of it. 

Q. Is it not, after all, an obstacle to the enforcement of the law, that it 
contains that feature ? 

A. I think the present law is constructed as well as any law could be. It 
does make provision for the sale of intoxicating liquors for legitimate purposes, 
and properly, I think. 

Q. Do the people of Lowell avail themselves of those provisions to get it ? 

A. I am sorry to say, that a great many of them get what they want at 
the grocers', and do not patronize the liquor agency ; but a good many do. I 
am sorry so many have the impression that the liquor is bad at the agency. 

Q. As a matter of fact, do the people of Lowell who buy and use liquor, 
go to the liquor agency, to any considerable extent ? 

A. I should think a great deal was sold that is not sold at the agency. 

Q. What proportion, should you say ? 

A . I am not able to say. 

Q. I see that in 1864, there were six hundred and forty-nine dollars' worth 
sold at the State agency in Lowell. You do not think that covers the whole 
consumption ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would that be any perceptible approach towards covering it ? • 



534 APPENDIX. 

A. No, sir. I think most of the wholesale traffic there has been carried 
on in the liquor-selling establishments. I get all the liquor I want — which is 
not much — at the agency, and get very good liquor, too. 

Q. If you used a great deal, you would hardly go there ? 

A. I think I should still trust the agency, rather than the grocers, sir. 

Q. How is the fact as to liquor being extensively sold in Lowell ? 

A. I think there is a great deal of liquor-selling in that city ; no doubt 
of it, Mr. Child ; but no more, according to the population, than formerly ; 
and among Americans, I should think not so much. 

Q. In 1845, when we used to have weekly temperance meetings, was there 
as much liquor sold there as now ? 

A. I should think so. About 1844, 1 was made aware of the remarkable 
fact, which affected me a great deal, that thirty young men were carried 
home drunk from a certain saloon, at a festival, in one night. (You know 
where it is, though you do not get your liquor there.) I followed one of my 
church-members in there once to watch him, as his shepherd, and to see what 
was going on there, and was invited to preach ; and I said if they would let 
me take for my text, " Out of the belly of hell cried I," I would preach a 
sermon there ; but they would not allow it. 

Q. As to the habit of drinking, how is it now in Lowell, as compared with 
1845? 

A. Among the foreigners, I should think there was more drinking ; among 
Americans, I shouldn't think it was so. I shouldn't think there were so many 
young men intoxicated as there used to be. 

Q. Do you not know that from 1845, for two, three or four years after I 
went to Lowell, the drinking of liquor was almost unknown throughout the 
Lowell population ? 

A. I know it was greatly restrained in the mills. 

Q. Is it so now ? 

A. I think there is a great deal of liquor drank, but I am not aware that 
there is more drank than at that time. I do not go into the mills now as I 
used to, and do not know how the fact is there. 

Q. Is it not a fact, that the use of liquor in the mills was almost entirely 
restrained at that time ? 

A. It was. The drinking of liquor was not allowed on the ground there, 
but that the people who worked at the mill got their liquor at the shops and 
used it in their families, to some extent, I know very well. 

Q. Do you know on what conditions the men were hired ? 

A. In one or two mills I do, but not in all. 

Q. Can they hire men now on condition that they shall not drink ? 

A. I am not aware how that is now. I know that the sale was prohibited 
in the corporations, and no license was even given for it. 

Q. Has the cause of temperance ever been so prosperous in Lowell as it 
was then, from that time to this ? 

A. Well, I think the cause has been somewhat at a stand since new influ- 
ences have come in — the war, &c, distracting attention from it. 

Q. Prior to the war, before I left Lowell, in 1860, was the cause of tem- 
perance in so good a condition as it was in '46, '47, and '48 ? 



APPENDIX. 535 

A. I should think that there had not been any great progress made. 

Q. Was it not worse ? 

A. I should not be ready to say it was a great deal worse than it was, 
really. I did not see any evidence of it. 

Q. You have seen no progress since that time ? 

A. Well, I have not seen that marked progress which I have seen at other 
times. 

Q. When the temperance reformation was at work, and the whole com- 
munity were united upon those means, was there not progress, very visible 
progress ? Was not the change from 1835 to '45 very marked ? 

A. A very great change was wrought in that way. 

Q. That was under the same law exactly that is proposed by these peti- 
tioners, and you say there was a very great change under that law ? 

A . There was a great change wrought by discussing the matter and circu- 
lating information about it. The cause went forward, but there were a good 
many moderate drinkers then. 

Q. But was not the tone of temperance feeling in the community very 
much elevated among almost all people who called themselves respectable ? 

A. It was, among a very large class. 

Q. Is that so to-day ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Among as large a class ? 

A. I think very likely there may be some more liquor drank ; but there is 
a strong temperance tone among the same class of people. In the churches, 
for instance, of all denominations, I find that almost to a man they are in 
favor of the total-abstinence principle. 

Q. That is not the question. The question is, Which is the best way of 
promoting the cause of temperance ? It was promoted, and great progress 
made, with the same sort of law which these petitioners propose. Another 
system was introduced, and the cause has not advanced, you admit. Now, 
do you think that the effect of this prohibitory law has been such that there 
has been the same advance from 1858 to 1867 as there was from 1835 to 
1845? 

A. I am sorry to say I think there has not been so much progress. I think 
the law has been too much relied upon, and moral suasion has been neglected, 
and other causes have come in and operated upon the community. 

Q. Has there not been a great change in the relaxing of those moral efforts 
which were so efficiently used before ? 

A. I do not find the cause of the change in the law at all. 

Q. I do not speak of the law. I ask you if, as a matter of fact, there has 
not been a great relaxation of those efforts which characterized the temper- 
ance reformation from 1835 to 1845 ? 

A . Yes, sir. The temperance people, to some extent, made the great 
mistake, when the law was enacted, of relying upon that. It was an excellent 
axe, but they let it lie. They needed to cut something down with it. 

Q. And as they relied upon the law, those efforts were given up ? 



536 APPENDIX. 

A. To some extent ; but still the temperance people have been a sort of 
live people always in that matter. I mean the radical temperance people ; I 
do not mean the other class. 

Q. Have you as many open public temperance meetings as before the 
passage of the prohibitory law ? 

A . We have not so many excellent orators to call the people out as when 
you were going for this prohibitory law, to say nothing about myself. We had 
great meetings then, and went for the law. 

Q. You went for the law as it was, did you not ? 

A. Yes, sir ; and we went for prohibiting further the sale of intoxicating 
liquor. Some of our best speeches were to this point : We must have a 
stronger law. Excellent speeches they were — I call them to mind distinctly — 
and the sentiment of the community was to sustain them. 

Q. Was not this it, after all, that they thought the prohibitory law was 
going to execute itself, and they would have the reformation, and there was 
no longer any need of these moral efforts ? 

A. I am sorry to say a great many temperance people made that mistake. 
The mill was a very good one, but the water got down somewhat, and it did 
not grind. 

Q. No matter how good your mill is, unless you get a working force on, it 
will not do anything, will it ? 

A. No, sir. We must have a public sentiment. That is the water to 
carry it. 

Q. The public sentiment now is not so good as then, for the execution of 
a prohibitory law ? 

A. Within the last two years things have come up again. The streams 
are rising, the floods are coming, the mill is beginning to work, and it is 
grinding up these folks considerably. 

Q. Have they closed the liquor-shops in Lowell ? 

A. I excepted the cities. In the cities, the business goes on. 

Q. Have the liquor-shops been closed in Lowell ? 

A. They have not, all of them ; not many of them. We are in a bad 
case there. 

Q. Is not liquor sold there as openly as tea and coffee ? 

A. It is, sir, I am sorry to say. I want to say this much, however: that 
these liquor-shops do not make as much display at their windows as they used 
to. I am not able to tell, when I go by, where liquor is sold. Where there 
were formerly bottles in the windows, I see an apple, a stick of candy, or a 
cigar, which I suppose indicates the character of the place to persons who 
understand it, but the bottles are not there. 

Q. They sell liquor there ? 

A. I suppose they do. I see people drunk there, and therefore I suppose 
they do. 

Q. Is there any benefit in closing the liquor shops in Boston, or elsewhere, 
if three or four are opened in secret places for every one that is closed ? 

A. Yes, sir. When the public sale is put down, I think it is a vast gain. 
It is exactly analogous to brothels. There will be vastly less young men 
tempted as long as the brothels are kept secret. Run out a sign, 



APPENDIX. 537 

and I tell you our young men will be In vastly more danger, as I look at the 
matter. I bold, therefore, that vast progress has been made in this thing. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) To go back to 1845, when things were going on 
so well, was it not under a prohibitory law, practically ? Did anybody sell 
liquor legally in Lowell V 

A. I think the system of licensing then prevailed; but what was sold, 
was sold illegally. 

Q. Did they not refuse licenses there ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. So that practically you had a prohibitory law ? 

Mr. Child. That is true. 

Witness. If brother Child will testify to that fact, I will to the other, 
that there was great progress there. We went into the matter most zealously 
— brother Child among others. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Was not the effort there to secure something like 
the present prohibitory law ? 

A. I think it was. I remember being a great deal affected by a speech of 
Mr. Child, in which he said that he would rather have his boy brought home 
stabbed by a dagger, than brought home drunk. Therefore he wanted a law 
to put it down. And I said Amen to that. 

Q. Was not the mill population far more largely American then than 
now? 

A. That is patent to everybody. When I first became a resident of 
Lowell, the persons employed in the mills were excellent young ladies, from 
the various New England States ; a very different class from what they are 
now. 

Q. Was not the influence of the Superintendent, Mr. Child, very effective 
in bringing about the state of things which then existed ? 

A. Certainly. The- influence of his public speeches was excellent. A 
first-rate worker he was. 

Q. Do you remember a time, in 1845, when so large a number of prosecu- 
tions hung over the heads of certain dealers there, and particularly over the 
head of the keeper of a fashionable saloon, that, for a very brief period, the 
traffic was stopped ? 

A. Certainly. That very man said to me, " I have turned my decanters 
bottom side up, and if you will keep still, I won't sell." I said to him, " My 
young men are coming into your place to get drunk, and we will make you 
trouble if you don't stop it." Said he, " Mr. Hanks, I have stopped it. I have 
turned my decanters bottom side up." That was the very expression he used. 

Q. As a matter of fact, theoretically and practically, was not the sale of 
liquor prohibited, and were not these effects produced by this prohibition ? 

A. I should say so, certainly. 

Q. Did we not feel at that time, that it was the inefficiency of the city 
authorities, together with the course pursued by the other cities, particularly 
Boston, that let the liquor-sellers loose again ? 

A. Certainly ; that was our complaint. On one occasion, a pamphlet was 
published, at the expense of the city, against prohibition. 

Q. Was not the honorable counsel on the other side aware of these facts ? 

68 



538 APPENDIX. 

A. Certainly. We worked together on this principle, when we were 
neighbors, and with a good deal of success. 

Q. (By Mr. SpoONER.) Do you know how much more brother Child 
had for his temperance addresses than he has for his advocacy of the license 
system ? 

-.4. I know we did not pay him anything. He was always ready to make 
a speech, and a very good one, too. We only gave him a vote of thanks, and 
backed him up as well as we could. That is all I know about that. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you know whether you have any of these 
organizations of Good Templars, &c, in Lowell ? 

A. I believe there are some there. 

Q. Do you know how many ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. You do not belong to any of them ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not. 

Q. They are secret ? 

A. Well, they are like masonry. You know about that. 

Q. You know about the Know-Nothings, do you not ? You took the oath 
there ? 

A. Yes, sir. We tripped up a good many rogues at that time. 

Testimony of Rev. Horatio Wood. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are city missionary of Lowell, I believe ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. For how many years have you filled that position ? 

A. Twenty-three years. 

Q. You have been sustained by individual charities from all classes of 
citizens in your labors of love ? 

A . Yes, sir. In part sustained by the corporations, and in part by the 
citizens at large. 

Q. Denominationally, your rank is what ? 

A. I have no present rank in a denomination. I stand in my position 
independent of any denomination. 

Q. You have sustained, I believe, at some period, Unitarian relationships ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And I suppose still retain your sympathies in that direction ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you state what occurs to you as valuable, bearing on the contro- 
versy here going forward, as deduced from your observation and experience ? 

A. I must say, with regard to the prohibitory law, that I cannot but give 
my mind in favor of it rather than of the license system, from what I have 
seen of its workings, especially when it was first enacted. It was my good 
fortune then to see a picture which has delighted my memory ever since. 
The sale of liquor was stopped in Lowell, so that the City Marshal had occa- 
sion to say, in a letter which he wrote to me at that time, that there was not 
a single place in Lowell where liquor was openly sold. 

Q. In your judgment, would that state of things have continued had there 
been a faithful execution of the law ? 



APPENDIX. 539 

A . At first, there was an idea that the law was going to be carried out, 
and it must be succumbed to ; but after a while it began to be asked, What is 
Boston going to do in the matter ? And when that question was asked, it 
began to be said, that Boston was going to sell. Then some began to make 
themselves bold to sell, and one city after another of our principal cities fell 
into the sale. Lowell fell in last of all. She was rather slow to wheel into 
the line of sale. 

Q. So that there was good reason to think, from the appearance of things, 
that if the law had been executed elsewhere, Lowell would have cheerfully 
executed and obeyed it ? 

A. Yes, sir. The temperance people and others were delighted with the 
change in the state of things, particularly with regard to the laboring class 
and the poor. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state the change observed in the condition 
of the poor ? 

A. A great many persons who had been accustomed to drink gave up 
drinking entirely. There were some who would have liquor in their houses. 
They would go beyond the line of the State, and get the liquor in New 
Hampshire, where shanties were set up for the purpose of vending it. But 
then it required more money to buy the liquor in any quantity than poor 
people generally had, and they soon got sick of that, and neglected to go after 
the liquor. One after another they would say, " Well, we know it is best for 
us." The wife would say, " Husband, you know it is best for you. You 
know we have been a great deal happier and a great deal more respected 
since this law was passed." And I will say here — what I wish distinctly 
understood in regard to the poor of Lowell — that there is not so much a 
desire on their part for liquor, but by the temptations around them, they are 
led into it ; and not only led into it, but they are cajoled and pressed, in 
every way, into the purchase of liquor. Those who sell are constantly endeav- 
oring to excite, among the laboring and lower class of people, a feeling against 
any restriction on the sale of liquor. It is the influence of those who sell 
liquor, operating upon this class in direct and indirect ways, that causes them 
to drink to the extent they do. * 

Q. So far as your observation goes, you think that the very class of men 
who cry out that the law cannot be executed, have done all they could to 
prevent it from being executed, and to keep up a feeling of irritation about 
the law on the part of those who can be induced to drink ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. That is the result of your observation among the poor of Lowell ? 

A. Yes, sir, that has been the result of my observation during the years I 
have been there — twenty-three years. I feel bound to say that. 

Q. In general, should you say there is anything in the present attitude of 
the cause in Lowell to create, in the mind of any candid, wise man, a feeling 
that we ought to abandon prohibition ? 

A. There is not, sir. 

Q. You feel confirmed in the correctness of the policy of prohibition under 
all this experience ? 



540 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. I think there has been no increase of any consequence, per- 
haps, in the amount of liquor drank within a year or two. During the war 
there was an increase, and that has continued since. Then men's minds were 
engrossed altogether by the war, and the subject of temperance they would 
not think of. We could not hold a temperance meeting in Huntington Hall, 
and have anything like a good audience. People would not give their atten- 
tion to it. Their minds swung away from it, and that gave the liquor-sellers, 
and those in favor of the sale, free play. 

Q. You do not attribute that, in any degree, to the law ? 

A. Not at all to the law. 

Q. You heard the testimony of Mr. Hanks ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Should you materially differ from him in his general view of the 
subject ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How long did this closing of the liquor-shops in 
Lowell, immediately after the passage of the law, continue ? 

A. The effect continued about two years, I should think — not the striking 
effect. 

Q. I refer to the general closing up. How long was it before they began 
to open again ? 

A. They began to open, I should think, in about six months' time. 

Q. Has there been any effectual closing of the places since that time ? 

A. I cannot say that there has been, sir. 

Q. Then for six months they were closed, and since those six months, 
liquor has been sold, publicly and openly, in Lowell ? 

A. It was not sold so freely afterwards as before. 

Q. It was sold publicly ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How is it now ? 

A. It is now sold publicly. The State Constabulary have not acted to 
that extent and with that energy in Lowell that they have here, and I think 
there is little perceptible difference yet. There is no great difference yet, in 
the sale or use of rum. 

Q. From 1852 to '60, how was it in regard to temperance meetings in Hun- 
tington Hall ? Were there as many as before ? 

A. I should think a part of the time there might have been ; but as near 
as I can recollect, I should think a large portion of the time there was not. 
The law was considered so excellent, that there was more trust in the law 
than there should have been. 

Q. t Have not some of those who profess to be friends of temperance 
engaged in forming a good many of these secret temperance organizations 
there ? 

A. I know very little about those organizations. I know very little about 
any temperance organizations. I never joined a temperance organization in 
my life, and I have always acted independently of any temperance organiza- 
tion. 



APPENDIX. 541 

Q. As a matter of fact, are there not a number of these secret organiza- 
tions in Lowell ? 

A. I cannot tell what their secresy is. I know that the Good Templars 
are in existence there. 

Q. Are there not several organizations under that name ? 

A . I cannot say how many. There are some two or three. 

Q. Do you understand them to be secret organizations ? 

A. I have not heard that subject mooted at all. I have given no attention 
to it. I am an entire stranger to the society, and can give no testimony at 
all in regard to it. I can merely give testimony as to facts. 

Q. You were there in 1845, '46, '47 and '48 ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Was the cause of temperance then more effective than it has been 
since ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. The State Constabulary have produced no apparent effect in Lowell 
in closing the places where liquor is sold ? 

A. I said so. 

Q. Nor in the sale ? 

A. Not very perceptibly. 

Testimony of Ex-Mayor Josiah Peabody. 

Q. (By Mr. Mixer.) You have held the office of Mayor of Lowell ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. At what period ? 

A. 1865 and '66. 

Q. You have been a resident of Lowell for many years ? 

A . Yes, sir. Ever since 1824. 

Q. You have been cognizant throughout of the doings of the city govern- 
ment, and the attitude of this question ? 

A. Yes, sir, to some considerable extent. 

Q. Will you state briefly to the Committee the results of your observation 
and reflection upon the subject ? 

A. Well, perhaps it is more intimately connected with the past two years 
than any other time. In 1864, there were no very great demonstrations made 
towards enforcing the law, and in 1865, 1 thought if it was possible to execute 
the law, I should like to see it done, and I did the best I could, with the 
materials I had to do with. I found it extremely difficult, from the reluctance 
of our police to execute the law. I think that, if they had been amenable to 
the chamber at the other end of the house, instead of being amenable to the 
Board of Mayor and Aldermen, the law could have been executed ? 

Q. Do you mean to say that the aldermen did not fully sustain you there ? 
Is that implied ? 

A. Well, no, I would not say that, because they make no objection ; but I 
wish to be understood as saying this : The appointments are made by the 
Mayor and Aldermen, and the action of the police, and particularly of the 
City Marshal, convinced me that they did not know whose hands they might 
fall into the next year. 



542 APPENDIX. 

Q. The joint action of the city government was a matter in their minds of 
some uncertainty ? 

A. Yes. In 1864 there were, I think, 855 arrests for drunkenness, the 
whole number of arrests being something over 1,500. The prosecutions under 
the liquor law were 26. In 1865, the first year of my administration, the 
prosecutions were 65, the whole number of arrests about the same as in 1864, 
and the number of arrests for drunkenness 650 odd — about 200 less. In 1866 
the number increased. The whole number of arrests increased. I think the 
whole number arrested for drunkenness was about 800, and the whole number 
of prosecutions about 177. Of course the enforcement of this law depends, to 
a very great extent, upon public sentiment. My own opinion is that the reason 
the law is disregarded, to a great extent, is, that in the enforcement of it, 
both by our local police (when they do anything), and by the State police, 
they begin at the wrong end. Our population in Lowell is peculiar, particu- 
larly those who are engaged in the liquor traffic. A very large proportion of 
them are foreigners. Out of the 855 arrested for drunkenness in 1865, less 
than 300 were Americans, and this proportion holds good in the division of 
arrests into the different classes of crimes for which persons are arrested. 
The law, I think, is disregarded, and public opinion disregards the law, from 
this fact : A very large proportion of the drunkards, as I said, are foreigners, 
and a very large proportion of those engaged in the liquor traffic are foreigners. 
There are some Americans, and some gentlemen who stand otherwise high in 
the community, engaged in the traffic — men of wealth and standing ; and so 
long as these men of wealth and standing are passed by and are not disturbed, 
as has been the case in our city, of course the lower strata of the community 
who are engaged in this traffic have very little respect for any such law. I 
think another matter which would have a tendency to check the traffic 
materially in our place, would be to put a stop to the open violation of the 
law by the railroad corporation. Last year I went to Mr. Winslow, Superin- 
tendent of the Boston and Lowell road, and besought him to abandon the 
practice of transporting liquor over the road, and he told me he would notify 
his employes to that effect. A few days subsequently, I received a notice 
which he said he had sent to all his employes, which I found, on looking at 
the date, was one that was issued in 1855, when the law. was revised. That 
was the date mine bore, and I suppose that all the employes had that notice. 

It came to my knowledge that in 1864 there was carried into the city of 
Lowell a quantity of ale and beer sufficient to give about eight gallons to each 
inhabitant of the city, to say nothing of other kinds of liquor. I think if the 
Legislature should say to the Boston and Lowell road, " If you do not stop 
violating this law, we will repeal your charter," they would stop it. I 
endeavored to try the thing on by the use of the law. I had a warrant made 
out, and took it to our police judge ; but he said it was a very large corpor- 
ation, and advised me to go to the Grand Jury, and refused to prosecute 
under it. Perhaps that was a very good reason, although it did not seem to 
me so at the time. Accordingly, I went to the District-Attorney of our dis- 
trict at the last October session, but I could not get the case taken up there. I 
was anxious to see whether the corporation was stronger than the Common- 
wealth, but I failed to get an opportunity to test the question. I think if our 



APPENDIX. 543 

State Constabulary were to commence at the other end and take the larger 
dealers, the law could be enforced. There are several gentlemen (I will not 
name them here, because it is unnecessary,) who are largely engaged in the traffic 
in Lowell. They supply the small dealers. There are a great many Irish 
women who buy perhaps a gallon at a time ; about as much money as they 
can raise at a time is enough to fill a jug, and when that is gone, it is 
replenished by these dealers. If these dealers were stopped, as they could be 
stopped, I think the law could be enforced fully, because these parties cannot 
buy in larger quantities ; and, more particularly, if the railroads were 
prohibited from carrying it into the city, it would be still more difficult to get 
it. I think the law has had a good effect in the city of Lowell, but it has not 
had so good an effect as it would have had, if earnest men had been willing 
to execute it. 

Q. You believe in the practicability of executing it in Lowell ? 

A. Certainly I do. 

Q. Would you have any hesitation, under all the circumstances, in advis- 
ing the preservation of the prohibitory law ? 

A. Not at all. I should regret to see the system of licensing adopted from 
this fact : I believe that, with the evils that arise from the sale of liquor, it is 
wrong ; and I do not believe in the State licensing anybody to do wrong. 

Q. I would like to ask your opinion on the question of the public senti- 
ment of Lowell, or, if you please, of your Senatorial District. It has been 
urged that the people are generally opposed to the law. Do you see any 
indications that that is the public sentiment of your Senatorial District ? 

A. My opinion is that the public sentiment is in favor of the law, judging 
from the expressions that have been made. I know of men who have 
expressed themselves in favor of the law — men who are in the habit of drink- 
ing occasionally. They would like to see it enforced as a matter of public 
good. 

Q. Who is the Senator from your District ? 

A. Hon. J. N. Marshall. 

Q. A resident of Lowell ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did the license question enter into the canvass in any way ? 

A. It did, somewhat. There were various questions that came up. We 
have had considerable tronble in our Senatorial District. If a man is put up 
in our Senatorial District, it is considered a very great amusement to knock 
him down. There was a portion of those persons who favor the enactment 
of a license law, — which, so far as my knowledge extends, embraces all the 
liquor-dealers, without any exception, — who voted for another candidate. 

Q. Who was their candidate ? 

A. Rev. Mr. Clark, of North Chelmsford. 

Q. The man who is here urging license ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The liquor-dealers to a man supported him ? 

A. Yes, sir. And then there were, perhaps, some other objections to 
Mr. Marshall, as there always are to every man who is in a position to be 
voted for, which operated against him. There was a vast amount of work 



544 APPENDIX. 

done, and I think the consequence was that there was a very small plurality 
for Mr. Marshall in Lowell. Some three or four votes, I think. 

Q. In Lowell, but not in the district, as a whole ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Sherman.) You would deem it fair to state that he was 
the regularly nominated candidate, and carried a great many votes in that 
way ? 

A. Oh, yes, he had the strength of the party. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) But it is a fact that Mr. Clark was deemed the 
desirable candidate by the liquor-dealers in Lowell, not in some cases only, 
but generally ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you understand it to be their feeling or opinion that his measure 
would repress their traffic ? 

A. I cannot say, for I had but very little conversation, except on general 
principles. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you know what the vote for Mr. Clark was 
in his own town of Chelmsford ? 

A. My impression is that there was a vote of one hundred against Mr. 
Clark. 

Q. How many votes are cast in that town ? 

A. Four hundred, I think. 

Q. Then his own town of Chelmsford did not feel that his policy would 
aid the temperance cause there ? 

A. It would seem not, from that, if that was the question on which they 
voted. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Your opinion is that the course pursued by the State 
Constabulary in arresting the lower liquor-dealers will not execute the law, — 
that they should begin at the other end ? 

A. That is my impression. 

Q. You tried with all your energy to execute the law, as far as you were 
concerned, as mayor ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I gave positive orders, — printed orders, to every member of 
our police force. 

Q. Did the city government fail to do anything that they could have 
done? 

A . Yes, sir. If it had been practicable, (I do not think it was, with the 
city government constituted as it was,) I would have turned out the entire 
police force, and tried again. 

Q. But as it was then constituted, you did all you could ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Taking the city of Lowell as it is now, as indicated by your last elec- 
tion, should you suppose that you could get a majority of your citizens in 
favor of the rigid enforcement of the present law, in the way you propose ? 

A. My impression is that we could. At any rate, I know that we should 
get a very large proportion of those who are considered our best citizens. 
Of course, there would be exceptions. 



APPENDIX. 545 

Q. As to the effect of your attempt to enforce the law during the two 
years of your mayoralty, were you able perceptibly to check intemperance ? 

A. Well, the first year I was in, I think the population increased. It had 
increased up to January, 1866, something over 5,000, and we had a return of 
a portion of the army during the latter part of 1865, which, of course, had a 
great many turbulent spirits in it, but the arrests for drunkenness fell off 
about 25 per cent, from the year previous. 

Q. Was it not the fact in 1864, that the population of Lowell was very 
much reduced from what it was before the war ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The mills were closed very extensively ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q, In 1864, was not the population less by five or six thousand than the 
ordinary population ? 

A. Yes, sir. I say in 1864 the arrests for drunkenness were 855, and in 
1865, under the pressure of the enforcement of the law, they were reduced to 
about 600. 

Q. Had the population fully returned in 1865 ? 

A. It had at the close of 1865. 

Q. During the greater part of the year, it had not ? 

A. No, sir. 

Testimony of Rev. Nahum Gale. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Will you be kind enough to state your residence 
and religious connections ? 

A . I reside in Lee, Massachusetts, and have been a member of the Con- 
gregational Trinitarian Church in Massachusetts for twenty-five years. 

Q. In the same place ? 

A . No, sir ; thirteen years in Lee. I was in Ware, Massachusetts, nine years. 

Q. What is your distance from Pittsfield ? 

A. About ten miles. 

Q. You are conversant with the business relations between your place and 
Pittsfield, in a general way ? 

A. Somewhat. Our place is on the railroad. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state what views you may entertain, as the 
result of your observation, touching the cause of temperance, especially as 
connected with the question of prohibition or license ? 

A. I am personally in favor of the present law in preference to a license 
law. I have been engaged in the temperance cause more or less ever since I 
was sixteen years of age. I signed the pledge soon after that, and have 
always practised total abstinence through all my course since that time. In 
1842 I preached in Hampshire County. We were under a license law, I think, 
then, and there was a discussion in relation to temperance, and a great reform 
from what there was in my boyhood. Afterwards, I advocated the present 
law, though I have never dealt very much with law. I have confined myself 
mostly to preaching as a minister on the subject, and have delivered addresses. 
I have confined my own personal efforts more to the moral influences than 
to the law. I have left that to others, who were not of my profession. 
69 



546 APPENDIX. 

Q. Did you feel, at this time, that you experienced any inconvenience 
from the existence of the law ? Did you deem it a bar to your efforts ? 

A. No, sir; I have never felt that. I think there was a time when there 
was an undue reliance upon the law, and there was a feeling that the work 
would be more summarily accomplished than by the long process of moral 
effort. I think that was temporary. I never ceased to preach total absti- 
nence, independently of any law on the subject, and found no difficulty in the 
way ; and never found any in Berkshire County, where I have preached the 
same doctrines. 

Q. And your people have always heard you ? They have made no 
complaint ? 

A. No, sir. I have never consulted them, but have preached on the 
subject whenever I have felt called upon to do so. 

Q. You have never heard that the ears or the hearts of your people were 
turned from your pleadings, because of the law ? 

A. No, sir; I do not think they have been. 

Q. What is your judgment of the state of the temperance cause? 
Taking your own immediate social circles, has it deteriorated or has it 
advanced of late years ? 

A. I don't think it has deteriorated at all, since my connection with our 
people. We have a large foreign population. Our population is between 
four and five thousand, and a large portion of it is foreign, over whom, of 
course, we have no influence. But among the various Protestant denomina- 
tions in the town, and the people who attend those churches, I do not think 
there has been any retrogade movement. My impression is, that since the 
war, there has been an advance ; that temperance has improved. There is 
less drinking, I think, in Lee now than there was three or four years ago ; 
and there have been times when the present law seemed to shut up the houses. 
The sale has not been so open any time during these thirteen years. The 
present law has seemed to be effectual, when it was in good hands. Our 
present State Constable has done considerable lately, and is disposed to do, so 
far as lie can get evidence. He is, I think, vigilant, and I think there is an 
apprehension on the part of those who sell secretly, that they will be obliged 
to stop. They have been prosecuted recently, as far as evidence could be 
obtained. It is very difficult, in many cases, I am told by the State Constable, 
to get evidence. I am inclined to think that within two years, perhaps, the 
cause of temperance has improved in our place. 

Q. In general, what is the attitude of the best friends of the temperance 
cause, whom you know, in relation to prohibition ? 

A. I think, sir, they are in favor of the present law. So far as the clergy- 
men of the various denominations are concerned, I have conversed with but 
one man who has expressed himself favorable to a license law, and I do not 
think he was very strenuous. I saw him in the cars, and he expressed some 
views a little different from mine. The clergymen of all denominations with 
whom I have been familiar for thirteen years, sustain the present law very 
decidedly. 

Q. Do you believe that the public ever could acquiesce in a license law 
that should throw open the traffic in intoxicating liquors to hotel-keepers uni- 



APPENDIX. 547 

versally, and apothecaries, grocers, and victuallers ; with all restraints on the 
sale of smaller liquors removed, and with all restraint removed from the 
wholesale trade ? In your opinion, would a license law of that character, 
with no penalties indicated at present, be acceptable to the temperance 
friends ? 

A. Ido not think it would be to any considerable number of those with 
whom I am acquainted. I have lived for thirteen years next door to the pub- 
lic house, which has recently been consumed. The church stands between my 
house, which is the parsonage, and this public house, and I have never experi- 
enced any inconvenience arising from disorder in that house. There has 
never been any open sale of liquor in the house. I do not know that there 
has ever been any clandestine sale. I should be very sorry to have another 
house opened there with a bar ; it would seem to me too near the church 
altogether, and too near the people who live in the town; 

Q. You would deem it a calamity to the church itself? 

A. I should, decidedly, to have anything of that kind 1 . 

Q. Have you ever known a liquor-shop next door to a church that affected 
it favorably ? 

A . I have never known one next door to a church ; but, speaking on gen- 
eral principles, I do not believe its influence would be favorable. I believe 
there would be disorders there incongruous with the sacred place. 

Q. If you were desirous of restraining the traffic, you would not throw 
around it the protection of law ? 

A. No, sir. I took the same view of it in the times of license, when I was 
a boy, and liquor was sold very freely. I am sorry to say that when a 
youth, I was employed in a store, and drew an immense quantity of liquor. 
I think men were licensed then who were " of good moral character," and as 
many as " the public good required." I should be very sorry to have any such 
terms used to-day. I should regard it as very deleterious, especially on the 
young, to have selectmen license men of " good moral character" to deal out 
this drink as a beverage. I think I expressed the opinion, as a boy, when I 
first began to have temperance ideas, that it was entirely inconsistent for the 
town authorities to license anybody to sell liquor ; and the County Commis- 
sioners refused for many years to grant licenses. That was the case in Ware 
for some time. The town was opposed to having anybody recommended for 
that business. 

Q. Do you find anything in human nature that is so thoroughly averse to 
the State enacting and executing laws based on the truth as is intimated in 
this neighborhood ? 

A. I don't think there is the same opposition in Berkshire, by any means. 
There is a general acquiescence in the law. 

Q. Your first men, your leading men, are generally law-abiding men ? 

A. Yes, sir. It never has been very much a question with us. I don't 
know that it has entered into our elections of representatives at all. 

Q. That is, all parties take that for granted '? 

A. Yes, sir. I think we have never sent a man to the General Court who 
was not in favor of the law. 

Q. Who represents you now ? 



548 APPENDIX. 

A. Mr. Branning. 

Q. Is he a temperance man, openly ? 

A. Oh, certainly. It has never been a question with us. 

Q. What should you say, generally, with regard to the question of the 
increase in the drinking usages of society, under ministrations that favor 
moderate drinking, as compared with the state of things under ministrations 
favoring and pleading for total abstinence ? 

A. Since the time I speak of, I have always lived under those who have 
preached total abstinence ; I have always taught it myself, and I have never 
known any clergyman near me who has preached any other doctrine. 

Q. Are you aware whether or not the predominating influences in Pittsfield 
are similar to those in your own town ? 

A . I am very little acquainted there. 

Q. Do you understand that wine-bibbing has been as strongly discounte- 
nanced in the church of your denomination in Pittsfield as it has been in your 
own church ? ' 

A. There is very little in my own church.- 

Q. Is there a great deal in Pittsfield ? 

A. Pittsfield has the reputation of having a good deal of intemperance. I 
don't know whether there is more or less there than in other towns as large 
as that. Our town is only about half as large as Pittsfield. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Before the enactment of the prohibitory law, was 
there any public sale in Lee ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. I think I never have seen a decanter in any 
store or shop. 

Q. Have you seen any change in Lee, in outward appearances, so far as 
regards the sale of liquor, since the enactment of the prohibitory law, from 
what it was before ? 

A. No, sir. I think that, practically, it has been prohibitory law ever 
since I have resided in the town. 

Q. There has been no particular change by the law ? 

A. I have resided there but thirteen years. I resided in Ware formerly. 

Q. You don't suppose there has been any particular change in Lee, or in 
the towns around you, since the passage of the prohibitory law ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. Since licenses were withheld, I don't know 
that there has been any change. 

Q. Has there been any particular benefit experienced from this prohibitory 
law in your neighborhood beyond what was experienced under the law as it 
existed before the enactment of the prohibitory law ? 

A. I don't know, sir. Not having been there, I cannot testify as to that. 

Q. What is your impression ? 

A. My impression is, that for a long time there has been no open sale of 
liquor in Lee. It has been sold contrary to law. 

Q. Kespectable people have given up the use of it ? 

A . Yes, sir, that is the case. 

Q. There are, I suppose, some secret sales, and always have been ? 

A. There is no doubt there are secret sales. There has been no time 
since I have been there when there have not been secret sales. Heretofore, 
in that region, the temperance movement has been very thorough. 



APPENDIX. 549 

Q. Do your people get their liquor for medicine at the State Agency, or 
elsewhere ? 

A. I do not know. If I have occasion to buy anything, I go to the 
State Agency. 

Q. Do you know whether the druggists furnish it ? 

A. I believe the druggist is the State Agent. I have always obtained it 
from him. I have had very little sickness, and very little occasion to buy 
anything. 

Q. The proposition of these petitioners is to leave the present prohibitory 
law, with all its penalties and all its provisions in force, in all such towns as 
shall decide not to have liquor sold. Would such a law as that be any incon- 
venience in Lee ? Your people would not vote to license ? 

A. I do not know. I should not be willing to say that. I do not know 
how they would vote. I do not know that that question ever came up. 

Q. They accomplished that before by their own action ? 

A. I do not know, sir. I presume so. I was not there. 

Q. You. perceive that the enforcement of this law may be a very different 
question in a town like Lee and in the city of Boston ? 

A. I have no acquaintance in Boston. I do not suppose there is any 
difficulty with us, and the towns around, except the general strong appetites 
and depravity in a certain class of men. No respectable men deal in it in 
our vicinity. 

Q. And you have no idea that if it lay with the people of the town, any- 
body would be permitted to deal in it ? 

A. I do not know. I do not know what changes might take place. 

Q. It could not be done unless the respectable people of your town have 
changed their opinion ? 

A. I do not know. I do not suppose it could. That is my impression. I 
would not say. I think the great body of respectable people are opposed to 
having any more liquor sold there. 

Q. That great body constitutes the majority of your people ? 

A. We have a very large number who would not be in sympathy with us. 
I cannot tell, if they should be marshalled on that question, how it would be 
decided. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You refer to the foreign population ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner). Lee is a manufacturing place ? 

A. Yes, sir; there are marble quarries, factories, paper-mills, &c, there. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say you have had a prohibitory law there, 
practically, for a great many years ? 

A. Yes, sir; and we had a prohibitory law when I was in Hampshire 
County. We chose County Commissioners who would not grant licenses. 

Q. Suppose you should refuse to grant licenses, how would you like it to 
have Pittsfield give licenses, and have the liquor-sellers send their bottles and 
jugs into your town ? 

A. We should not like it at all. 

Adjourned. 



550 APPENDIX. 



SIXTEENTH DAY. 

Tuesday, March 19th, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony on 
behalf of the Remonstrants was continued. 

Testimony of Hon. Nathan Crosby. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You reside in Lowell, I believe ? 

A. Yes, I do, sir. 

Q. You are a judge of the Police Court, I believe ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been so ? 

A. Over twenty years. 

Q. Previous to that, I believe you were, for a number of years, engaged 
as agent for one or more temperance societies in this State ? 

A. I was agent of the Massachusetts Temperance Union for several years. 

Q. I would like to have you give the result of your observation of the ope- 
rations of the prohibitory law and of license laws, and your opinion of their 
relative value, and anything in your experience and observation which you 
think would be valuable in connection with this question. 

A. When I went into the temperance enterprise, I went into it more for 
the purpose of passing through the Commonwealth as a lawyer, than as a mere 
temperance agent, to show the constitutional propriety of the law of 1838 — 
what was called the fifteen-gallon law — to settle the question, so far as I could? 
upon the public ear, that that law was not oppressive, but was constitutional 
and proper. I had been interested in the subject of temperance ever since I 
came into the Commonwealth, which was in 1826. That was soon after a 
few men had made the subject of temperance popular, or at any rate, had 
awakened the mind of the community to it. Dr. Edwards and Dr. Hewitt 
had then been in the field two or three years ; and I had met Dr. Kittredge, 
a somewhat famous man in the temperance enterprise, at the court in Grafton 
County, and, having known his reputation as a man reclaimed from intemper- 
ance, I fell in his way, and become interested enough in the temperance 
cause to go into it ; and I took the pledge then against the use of ardent 
spirits. But the first effort which I now remember to have made, or to have 
aided the public in making, was in Essex County, in perhaps 1827 or '28, 
when our effort was to regulate the licensed sale of liquor, so far as we could, 
by choosing the men who should be licensed. There were so few taverners at 
that time that we could not make much choice then from them. They owned 
or leased their places, — there were but one or two in a town, — and so the 
choice was limited to selecting, so far as we could, those grocers who would 
make the best use of their licenses, — those in whom we could have the greatest 
confidence ; and I recollect that in Essex County our operations before the 
County Commissioners were restricted to resisting certain persons who applied 
for licenses, and waiving objections to certain other persons. About that time 



APPENDIX. 551 

we commenced procuring indictments against those who were not licensed. 
We had a large number of these indictments in Essex County, under Judge 
Minot, then prosecuting attorney. I remember being interested in those pros- 
ecutions. The first point which I wanted to submit to the committee upon 
that was this : that we endeavored then to make the best of the license law, by 
selecting the men who should be licensed. Applicants for a license were then 
required to show the County Commissioners that they were men of good 
moral character, and various things of that kind ; and we held them to that- 
If we could attack a man on the ground of his immorality or of his bad influ- 
ence in the community, we did so, and regulated the sale, so far as we could, 
in that way. 

It run on in that way, — restraining the sale by selecting the men, — until 
the temperance enterprise had so engrossed the public mind, that the law of 
1838 was passed. That is the next point I have ; for I have not looked over 
any documents ; I speak only from recollection, and from a gathering up of 
the facts as I came along on the railroad. That law of 1838 was a prohibi- 
tion up to fifteen gallons ; and, as the Committee know, it was familiarly called 
the " fifteen-gallon jug," and a great deal of fun was made of it. That was 
followed by the " striped-pig," and dumb-waiters at the bars of hotels, where 
a little table swung round and you could get your liquor, but could not see 
who sold it to you, and therefore you could not testify against anybody. It 
will be remembered that that law was resisted because it was said to be 
oppressive of the poor and the men of small means, who could not buy fifteen 
gallons at a time, while men of wealth and standing could. We met that as 
well as we could, although we found it was not the poor men who applied for 
the repeal of that law, but gentlemen like Mr. Otis. For two years, that 
great resistance to the law of 1 838 was called " the petition of Harrison Gray 
Otis and others." They were men in rather high standing, — a great many of 
them retired men, — men of means, and men who never felt that that law was 
oppressive to, or touched them at all. But they were in the field resisting 
that law. At the end of two years that law was repealed. 

At that time, I came into the enterprise publicly. We then thought we 
would make the best of the license law, which was restored by the repeal of 
the other. Our first step was to induce the County Commissioners to with- 
hold licenses ; and whenever we could induce them to do that, it was practi- 
cally a prohibitory law. After we had discussed that matter in the public 
journals for some time, I passed rapidly through the Commonwealth, attend- 
ing the meetings of the County Commissioners, and in 1841 or '42, (I cannot 
now say which year it was,) we had been so successful, that I think in the 
whole Commonwealth there were no licensed sales, except in Boston, and pos- 
sibly Salem, one year. All the County Commissioners in the Commonwealth 
withheld licenses ; but the cities were authorized, under the law, to grant 
licenses, and I believe licenses were granted in Boston, and I think, one year 
in Salem; although, one year or more there were no licenses granted in 
Boston by the city authorities. The great effort then was, to have practically 
a prohibitory law under the license law. To enable us to carry that strong 
in the public mind, we originated the " Cold Water Army," addressing the 
schools, and getting the children out for exhibitions and celebrations, under 



552 APPENDIX. 

the term " Cold Water Army," with banners, songs, and everything of that 
kind. 

There followed upon that enterprise the reformed drunkards ; and it has 
seemed to me, in the history of this great enterprise, that whenever we got 
upon the law somewhat strong, there was a corresponding interest in moral 
influences, and some moral power came in to lead the advocates of the law to 
suppose that the thing might be accomplished without pressing the law so 
hard ; and, therefore, when the reformed drunkards came, they created a 
tornado of public feeling against drinking and against the desolations of 
drunkenness, so that all the people of the Commonwealth raised their hands and 
said, " We have got it now. Now there will be an end to this matter. There 
will be no more sales. Nobody will want to drink now. We see the desola- 
tions of drunkenness ; we see that men can be reformed." There never 
was, perhaps, such a public sentiment created upon any one topic, which run 
so like a furor through the Commonwealth, as that created by the reformed 
drunkards. Of course, men stood back ; prosecutions under the law were 
temporarily suspended. However, that enterprise, like all others which arouse 
the community, flagged after a while, there being no such thing, somehow, as 
keeping an excitement in the community up to a high point any great length 
of time. At last it subsided, the enterprise went rather into discredit, and 
then its friends seemed to look around to see what was to be done ; and in my 
knowledge of the history of the enterprise, there has been no time when its 
friends were not moving in the direction of legal restraints, and enforcing the 
law in some form. At times we had an enforcement of the law very fully. 
The laws have been changed from time to time. I do not propose to rehearse 
them, or call them up particularly ; but we have always had more or less 
prosecutions in my court and in other courts through the Commonwealth, in 
one form or another; but whenever we seized upon the vendors of intoxicating 
drinks, under any law, we would find resistance, and the cases would go from 
one court to another, up to the Supreme Court of the United States at last, 
and the doubt in the public mind with regard to the lav/ would always lead 
to a suspension of the prosecutions, to a greater or less extent, until we could 
arrive at results, because we found that the prosecuting attorneys and even 
the courts of the Commonwealth, however well disposed to enforce the law, 
were not disposed to go on accumulating a great mass of prosecutions and 
hold them in suspense, waiting the ultimate decision. Therefore, while they 
would accumulate, they would lie and wait for a decision ; and these decisions 
have resulted variously, although generally they have been in favor of our 
propositions. I know that one time after the prohibitory law was passed, and 
under one of the provisions of the law, parties assumed to regard spirituous 
liquors and intoxicating liquors as out of the protection of law by the prohibi- 
tion, and undertook to destroy them. Prosecutions were then suspended for 
a time, waiting for the final result, because Judge Shaw, at the nisi prim trial, 
ruled the thing as legal ; but after a while the full court overruled that 
decision. I merely allude to this, if the Committee please, for the purpose of 
showing, that while we have been diligent in instituting proceedings, from 
time to time, in the courts, we have been delayed and kept at bay by the 
uncertainty of the final result in the courts ; and whenever those cases were 



APBEND1X. 553 

hung up, we fell Lack more upon the moral power of the community. I 
believe myself, Mr. Chairman, that the temperance men have been honest 
men, fearless men, determined men, in their efforts to protect the community 
from the ravages of the sale of intoxicating liquor, and that they have dili- 
gently pursued legal resistance as far and as fast, ordinarily, as they could 
consistently with the public mind, and with getting men to work in a combined 
form ; so that while we have delayed sometimes in legal enforcements, we 
have had other operations almost always in the field. 

When the " Cold Water Army " had passed away, and its influence, and 
the influence of the reformed drunkards, — (and there was a striking fact 
again : that when the " Cold Water Army " had possession of the Common- 
wealth, the reformed drunkards came in, and the "Cold Water Army" 
retired, simply because the community could not sustain two such enterprises, 
based on the creation of public excitement, systematically) — I say, when these 
had passed away, " Bands of Hope " were established among the children, and 
the effort was made to create a fresh current in that quarter, so as to educate 
them right. But I would now refer to another exhibition of moral power, in 
the establishment of the " Rechabites " and " Sons of Temperance," and all 
the organizations of that kind which have been started through the Com- 
monwealth. And I wish to remind the Committee, too, that when any such 
effort comes up, there are always certain men (for it is difficult to have men 
think alike) who will not go into it ; who stand aloof; they prefer the old 
way, or some other way. There are a great many of the old temperance men 
still in the field, who took the old pledges and worked under the old organiza- 
tion, who did not sympathize particularly with the " Cold Water Army," or 
the reformed drunkards. Although a great many clergymen admitted the 
reformed drunkards into their pulpits and congregations, others were not dis- 
posed to do so. You cannot bring masses of men into one channel of influ- 
ence, and then carry all of them into another channel, — some will linger 
behind ; they will not all go together. But these men have retired, so as not 
to keep up distinct organizations, and thus appear to counteract the influence 
of others. Hence* a great many temperance men of the old stamp have 
stayed at home quietly, bidding the Rechabites and all these associations God- 
speed, letting them run, and aiding them with their sympathy, &c. ; and they 
have had possession of the field for some time. 

It has also been somewhat striking, that once in a while a provision of law 
would be made by the Legislature which would repeal former statute provis- 
ions. I think that two or three times, within my recollection of the history of 
this matter, there has been an enactment which has swept from the docket a 
great many cases which were hanging there, waiting for the ultimate decision 
which would twine the rope, if I may so say, around the trade, after an enact- 
ment had been made. I call to mind now, Mr. Chairman, as evidence that 
the temperance men have been disposed to enforce the restraining laws, that 
a little change was made a year or two ago in the law, by which we lost some 
1,700 or 2,000 cases in the Commonwealth which were hanging in the courts, 
and which allowed all those men to escape the penalty of the law. The very 
existence of so many cases pending goes to show that the temperance men 
were disposed to do as well in regard to the enforcement of the law as they 
70 



554 APPENDIX. 

rationally could. As far as I can now look back, and call to mind the history 
of legal and moral proceedings, the temperance men have not slumbered nor 
slept in the Commonwealth, but have only, from time to time, changed hands, 
and have been, on the whole, quite diligent for thirty or forty years. It is 
now about forty years — perhaps precisely forty years — since we first resisted 
the granting of licenses to certain men in Essex County, and thence through 
the Commonwealth ; and from that time down, I contend that we have done 
substantially what we could, and as fast as we could, under the law, as well as 
in the use of moral means, to advance the cause of temperance. It is to be 
taken into account that we have always been resisted, and when the pinch has 
come, somehow or other, — I do not know how, because I am never behind 
those curtains, — retired men in the Commonwealth have been brought out to 
stand forth prominently, as if the world was likely to come to an end by 
pressing this matter too hard. 

Q. Has it not been the persistent purpose of the friends of temperance 
always to prohibit the sale of liquor, as far as public opinion would sustain 
them in it ?' 

A. I believe — and I think I have had a pretty fair experience upon it for 
forty years — that they have always been inclined to make the best of the law 
they had, and to get the best law they could. 

Q. And to get stronger ones as fast as they could ? 

A. To get stronger ones as fast as they could, and then enforce them. 
Now, we have another little matter of history about this prohibitory law. 
"We were beginning to enforce it in the courts and elsewhere when the war 
came on. Well, the war has thrown us back three or four years in that mat- 
ter. We all felt that patriotism was the first thing, and that it was not worth 
while to distract the community or trouble anybody by outside issues. All 
these matters were quietly suspended until the question of license came up — 
what effect the United States license would have ? We had prohibition, and 
the great question, the interesting question was, whether the granting of 
licenses under the United States Revenue Act would authorize the sale in 
this Commonwealth ? That question was raised ; it could not be settled in a 
minute ; it must take a year or two. Finally it was settled. Then the 
question came up whether, if certain property was taxed, it did not give leave 
to use it, in any way ? Some such question arose — I do not remember the 
precise form it took — that went up, and that is settled. I think now, Mr. 
Chairman, that with the prohibitory law, with the experience of the past forty 
years in the enforcement of law, and in the operation of the various machinery 
to bring moral power to bear upon the community, we are ready in this Com- 
monwealth — and I see signs of it in other States — to bind all the scattered 
powers and forces of the temperance enterprise — Rechabites, Sons of Tem- 
perance, Cold Water Army and reformed drunkards — all the hosts that have 
been heretofore scattered, more or less, in their power and influence — we are 
ready now, I say, with the decision of the Court apparently in our favor, to 
bind all these scattered forces together. I understand that as Ave proceed, 
other legal questions are likely to come up, but those questions are limited, 
covering only a portion of the ground — as to the destruction of the liquor, and 
certain proceedings in cases of seizure ; but substantially, the legal field has 



APPENDIX. 555 

been surveyed and settled, and now we have only to rally the temperance 
power of this Commonwealth to enforce the law, and I think we have the 
traffic under our feet. I have no doubt of resistance ; I have no doubt of 
sales ; I have no doubt that that crime, like other crimes in the community, 
will exist, and that a great many men will be found to sell liquor — not, 
perhaps, publicly, openly, but privately, quietly, secretly. 

I have one word which I want to say, because I have been some little 
troubled in my own mind, as I have looked at the evidence before this Com- 
mittee in regard to liquors ; there has been an attack made upon the liquor 
which has been sold by the State agents. I do not know but it is right 
enough ; I do not know but they get the best they can find. But my doctrine 
is, that there is not any that is good. My notion is, that there is no true 
standard of liquor, and no true liquor — what is understood in the common 
parlance of the day as true liquor ; that the only pure thing about it is the 
alcohol that is in it, and that is found more or less in all the liquors, with com- 
binations to modify it, to lessen its power and severity, and to adapt it to the taste- 
I think it is just the same abroad that it is here. There seems to be an impres- 
sion, that if you get an imported liquor, you have got a true liquor, as much 
as when you import a horse from Arabia, you get an Arabian horse. But it 
is not so. If I understand it, some of our alcohol, — not much, but some, — is 
carried abroad, and returned here in imported liquor, which is supposed to be 
the genuine article made somewhere where they make true liquor. But when 
you go there, you find how brandy is made ; that it is made by putting alcohol 
and the skins and seeds of grapes, and various other elements together, and 
infusing the mixture with one drug and another, until they make what 
answers the term of brandy. That is manufactured there and sent here just 
as they manufacture it at Albany and Boston, and it is no better, perhaps, for 
having been made on the other side of the water and brought here, excepting 
as the voyage may make it better. So that when you talk of pure liquors 
and poor liquors, I think it is pretty much sham and nonsense. It is all a 
manufactured article, all containing nearly the same destructive elements, 
perhaps not always the same, but substantially the same ; and I do not see 
why the liquor obtained by the State agents of wholesale dealers, or obtained 
from any other source, is not likely to be as pure as that which is sold in out- 
side channels. I think it is an attempt to throw odium upon the arrangements 
which the State has made to supply the community with what was deemed by 
the Legislature to be a matter of necessity, to supply the mechanic arts and 
those calls in the form of medical prescriptions. At any rate, I apprehend 
that the liquors sold by the State agents are well enough for the pui'poses for 
which the Commonwealth intended they should be sold, and that they are as 
good as any that can be found in Boston for these purposes. I wanted to put 
that thought of mine before the Committee, that it may be examined, to see 
if there is anything in it. I believe the attack is wrong. I do not know pre- 
cisely what is meant by a restrained license, or how the traffic can be 
restrained so as to be as safe as prohibition. Our system of State agencies 
amounts to a license of one man in so many thousand people, so that the com- 
munity may have a supply of all the liquors. There is no limitation there. 
The State agents are allowed to sell all those, and for aught I see, that is a 



556 APPENDIX. 

license, restrained, perhaps, to the point nearest prohibition, for the arts and 
for medicine. If anybody wants a freer sale than that, I would not object, — 
no, I won't say I would not object, — but let it be opened to classes of persons. 
I would not have licenses granted to sell to everybody. We never had such 
a law heretofore. Our license law was always restricted : " You must not sell 
to idiots, paupers, drunkards or minors." These were excepted classes. If 
other classes want to be brought in, and to have liberty to buy, let us see if 
they need it and ought to be supplied with it, and if so, name them in classes ; 
men of a certain amount of money ; men of a certain standing in the com- 
munity ; men who think a little wine is good " for the stomach's sake." If 
they will subscribe that to the man who has it to sell, let him sell to them in 
limited quantities. I would attach to the present prohibitory law a provision 
that should allow any portion of the community to come in as honorary mem- 
bers, who ought to be entitled to that distinction, (if there are any such,) who 
should be allowed to get a little something to drink, just as you would elect 
persons honorary members of an association, or give them free tickets to a 
public dinner, or on a railroad. I think I would confine it to them. I don't 
see anybody who is entitled to it, unless it is as a matter of distinction. 

I confess, gentlemen of the Committee, that I have pretty strong and 
earnest feelings in this matter, having been a soldier in the cause for forty 
years, having been a teetotaler for thirty years, believing that men can live 
more happily without liquor than with it, and that it is a great deal better to 
withhold the temptation from those who cannot resist it, than it is to have 
open doors for the sale of intoxicating drinks. I am persuaded that temper- 
ance men can enforce the prohibitory law ; that they have practically enforced 
all restraining laws as far as they could, and substantially as fast as they 
could. As I said before, we have repeatedly done it in Lowell, nearly to the 
extent of closing up the shops, and, at times, the places of sale have been 
•pretty well closed through the Commonwealth. I think the prohibitory law 
is very successfully in operation in most parts of the State. I hope we shall 
be allowed to try it, now that we have got the decisions of the courts in our 
favor, and now that I believe that all temperance men, who have been striv- 
ing and struggling these forty years, (those of us who are old enough,) are 
willing now to combine their powers to enforce this law, and try the strength 
of it. 

Q. (By Mr. Jewell.) Do you think there is less drinking now than 
there was twenty-five years ago among the middling classes of community ? 

A. It is extremely difficult to say, there are so many things which ought 
to come in in making up an opinion on that matter. In the first place, since 
this temperance enterprise was inaugurated, there has been a very great 
increase of population, and a very great increase of the foreign element- 
There are a great many things to be taken into account in considering 
whether there is more liquor drank now than formerly. If I were asked 
whether I thought there were more temperance men in this Commonwealth 
now, than twent}>- years ago, I should say there were. 

Q. By " temperence men " you mean total abstinence men ? 

A. I mean total abstinence men. 



APPENDIX. 557 

Q. Well, twenty, twenty-five and thirty years ago, it was not common at 
all, was it, for people to have liquor in their own houses ? It was rather dis- 
creditable to have it, and a man did not offer it to his neighbors or guests in 
those times at all ? 

A. I know, sir. 

Q. Is it so now ? 

A. I think there are more families now who have wine at parties and at 
weddings than at the time to which you allude, because then public sentiment 
was very sharp, and men did not like to run counter to it. I remember, now, a 
remark which Mr. Leverett Saltonstall made, while the temperance enterprise 
was going on : " Why," said he, " I am so afraid of public sentiment on this 
matter, that when I take a tumbler of water at a hotel, I take care to turn all 
round that everybody may see it is water, for fear they should think I was 
drinking liquor." There was such a feeling in regard to temperance at that 
time, that people who had parties, although they might have liked to have 
brought forward their wines, were under restraint, and did not do it. 

Q. That feeling does not now prevail, does it ? 

A. It does not prevail, I confess, as much as it did then. 

Q. How do you account for that ? 

A. I account for it by the influence of just that class of men who have 
come here and testified in favor of this license law — men who have been 
brought out from their retirement, and have thrown their influence against the 
prohibitory law. There was a class of men — the upper men, the upper class 
— who, I will not say always held back, but who were never heartily with us ; 
but when they could not get along without submitting to our influence, they 
yielded to it. Now they do not ; they do not feel under so much restraint. 
I do not believe that, twenty years ago, you could have found a man who 
would have testified in favor of a license law before a committee of this Legis- 
lature. 

Q. Public sentiment would not then have permitted it ? 

A. No, sir, and it does not permit it now. I think there is a very strong 
feeling in the community that these men have made a mistake ; that the com- 
munity are stronger in temperance practice and temperance principle than 
they supposed. I think it will be so found. I think that if a license law 
were passed, there would be an uprising on that matter as there was with 
regard to the war. That is my opinion about it — that there is a very strong 
and immense temperance force in this community. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Don't you think it is gaming, the country 
through, very decidedly ? 

A. I think so, very decidedly. 

Q. Don't you conceive the moral efforts to be more active now than at 
any time for many years ? 

A. It looks so to me. They are starting up. I think the discussions 
which have been had at Washington upon the law have had a good effect. 
The world understands, by our daily papers, that these questions have been 
carried up there, and have been settled ; and now the temperance people have 
a hope such as they have not had when the questions were in doubt. Then, 
again, I think the temperance revival at Washington, if I may call it so, — 



558 APPENDIX. 

though I don't know that they have ever had anything there before, so that 
it can be called a revival, — is having an effect all over the country. I was at 
the second great Congressional meeting at the Capitol, and it was a wonderful 
meeting in spirit — the hall thronged, the speakers up to the point, clear up to 
the point, of prohibition. One Senator said that the Capitol had been 
reformed, some year or two before, by act of Congress, and that it was now 
time to commence reconstruction at the other end of the Avenue ; and the 
ladies were called upon not to offer intoxicating drinks to their January 
callers, — the thing coming specifically to the point, touching, I thought, the 
very marrow-bones of the people. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You spoke of the efforts that were made after the 
repeal of the fifteen-gallon law, to prevent the granting of licenses. Was 
there not, at that time, a good deal of discussion in all the towns in reference 
to choosing such men as would not prohibit licenses ? 

A. Yes, sir, that was one of our points. 

Q. Did we not at that time undertake to choose such men always as were 
strict temperance men ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Did not that produce and keep alive a very strong temperance feeling 
in the community, from the periodical return of the election of officers, and 
these questions being involved ? 

A. I have no doubt. 

Q. During the discussions that followed the repeal of the fifteen-gallon 
law, when an issue was made in every town on the choice of men who would 
not approbate licenses, was Or was not the effect great in diminishing the use 
of intoxicating liquors in the community ? 

A. I have no doubt that, so far as we could restrain and withhold licenses, 
that diminished it. I have no doubt that we made temperance men by those 
very influences. 

Q. There was, then, very perceptible progress in temperance, for four or 
five years after the repeal, in 1840 ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Was it as great as at any other period you have ever known in your 
observation of the history of the enterprise ? 

A. Taking the ground then covered by the " Cold- Water Army," — for 
that followed at once, — one of my great means was that 

Q. That was in connection with this very movement ? — they were going 
on together ? 

A. Precisely. That was in the four or five years from the spring of 1849 
to 1853. We had the "Cold- Water Army," and we had the reformed 
drunkards in that period ; and, as I said before, they excited the whole Com- 
monwealth ; went into every dwelling ; and the sentiment thus created showed 
itself at the polls in sending men to the Legislature who would give us legal 
protection, and in appointing selectmen who would not apply for licenses or 
recommend persons for license. 

Q. When licenses were refused, and thus prohibitory law established, how 
was it during that period with regard to open sales ? Take Lowell, for 
instance, along in '42, '3, '4, '5, and '6, about the time you went into the 



APPENDIX. 559 

Police Court, or prior to that three or four years and a year or two after- 
wards, — how was it at Lowell ? 

A. I had no knowledge of Lowell until I removed there in 1843. I went 
into the court two years and a half after I went to Lowell. There were open 
sales, excepting in spasms, when we had the right city government. When the 
mayor, the city government generally, the marshal and the police, sympa- 
thized with the movement, we ' had no trouble, and did, in one or two 
instances, shut up the shops ; but generally in Lowell there have been open 
sales. 

Q. I have no doubt of that ; but whether at that time there were as many 
open places of sale in violation of law, while the licenses were withheld, as 
there have been at other times ? 

A. I apprehend the increase of population would qualify that somewhat. 
There was a large increase of population after 1843 in Lowell ; probably 
there were more places for sale. I don't know but there are more places for 
sale now than there were at that period. But there are not as many places 
for sale now, and not so much drunkenness now, as there was before the war. 
After the close of the war, for a little while, there was a great deal of drunk- 
enness, but that has passed away, and there is much less, in my estimation, as 
far as I can judge of it. 

Q. The statement was made here the other day that the number of per- 
sons arrested for drunkenness by your police was greater since the war than 
during that time. 

A. For awhile. 

Q. Now — even last year, 1866. 

A. It may be so. 

Q. You have not consulted any statistics ? 

A . No, sir. I have not looked at anything. 

Q. Then the drinking-habits, usages and practices of the people were 
really very much diminished during that period of temperance effort, after 
1840, when the fifteen-gallon law was repealed ? 

A. I should say so. 

Q. Do you know of any period in your observation and knowledge of this 
temperance reform, in which apparently greater or as great progress was 
made as during that period? 

A. I think the friends of temperance became perhaps alarmed when that 
law, which only prohibited sales under fifteen gallons, was repealed. They 
were impressed with the power which was brought up from unexpected 
sources against that law, and they applied themselves, as I said, very diligently 
and earnestly to the " Cold Water Army " and to the reformed drunkards, 
and they created such an impression through the Commonwealth that there 
* was great advance in temperance sentiment. 

Q. The present prohibitory law is a more perfect machine, in your opinion 
if I get the right impression from your testimony, than that law was ? 

A. It is more perfect, inasmuch as it covers all sales, and that covered only 
those under fifteen gallons. 

Q. No, I mean the twenty-eight gallon law. After the repeal of the 
fifteen-gallon law, we had the old license law or twenty-eight gallon law in 



560 APPENDIX. 

force, but which was suspended in some cases by the action of the towns and 
counties, and therefore, practically, there was prohibition. The present pro- 
hibitory law you regard as better than that twenty-eight gallon law, and the 
people withholding licenses under it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. It was after the repeal of the fifteen-gallon law that there was the 
greatest progress in temperance you have known in the history of the reforma- 
tion ? 

A . Yes, sir, after the repeal of the fifteen-gallon law. 

Q. Now, under the present better law, in your judgment, do you think 
that from 1852 down to the present time, the progress of temperance has been 
as great during any three or five years as during the period you have testified 
to? 

A. No, sir, I think not, and for this reason, (if I may be allowed to state 
the reason, as I have answered the question directly :) The community then, 
as I said before, all united, and gave the field to the " Cold Water Army" and 
reformed drunkards. Since the prohibitory law, we have been, as I remarked 
before, trying questions of law all the way through, and met with various 
hindrances and delays by the accumulation of cases. We, therefore, have not 
had the full benefit of the law. When we were about to have its due enforce- 
ment, under the decisions of our own courts, the cases would be carried up. 
Then the war came on, and we have been kept in abeyance until now. Under 
the new settlement, as it seems to me, we may have a revival all round. 

Q. Was there not a more vigorous action of public sentiment upon the 
question for a few years after the repeal of the fifteen-gallon law, than there 
has been since the prohibitory law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In your opinion, is not that action of the public voice and public 
opinion necessary to make any law on this subject effective ? 

A. It is an advantage, undoubtedly, to have public sentiment go with 
public prosecutions under the law ; but they are not necessarily connected. 

Q. Do you think you can execute a law with any effect with the entire 
public sentiment against it ? 

A. No, I think not, and perhaps that is the reason why the law against 
profanity is not enforced. There are too many profane people, and a great 
many men say, " On the whole, I would not have prosecutions under that ; " 
but the law remains and may be enforced against individuals. 

Q. I will ask you again, Judge, do you think that unless the public senti- 
ment is such that it demands through the courts and municipal officers and 
juries the execution of the law, any law upon such a subject as this will be 
executed, so as to produce any effect upon the drinking usages of society ? 

A. Perhaps not. I think that question should be qualified. As I said # 
before, I think law may be maintained, even if public sentiment does not 
fully concur in its enforcement. 

Q. That was not precisely the question. A certain amount of public 
sentiment is necessary, is it not, upon any of these laws, to secure convictions 
through courts and juries, or secure the administration and execution of them 
by constables and police officers ? 



APPENDIX. 561 

A Well, I will admit that. 
Q. That is true, is it riot ? 

A. Yes, sir, that is true; but I think the doctrine is this, Mr. Child : 
There is a public sentiment in favor of law all through the Commonwealth. 
The question about enforcing it is, how much resistance you are to meet to its 
enforcement ? 

Q. Is there any public sentiment in the Commonwealth in favor of the 
execution of a law because it is law, (I do not say that this is applicable to 
the prohibitory law,) which the moral sense of the community rejects ? Take 
the fugitive slave law — did that have any force at all in Massachusetts, any 
more than a piece of parchment ? 

A. Well, it carried a man out of the State. I suppose it had that amount 
of force. People resisted it. 

Q. Had it any other effect than to create a spirit of resistance to that 
law? 

A. I think it did create that, rightfully. 

Q. Then such a law as that, not in accordance with public sentiment, can 
do no good as a reforming and restraining measure in any community ? 

A. Not when the public sentiment of the community is aroused so as to 
make that opinion felt. 

Q. You say there is not the same public sentiment in favor of the pro- 
hibitory law as there was in favor of the state of things in 1838, — can you 
give any reason why that is so ? 

A. I beg your pardon, I say right the other way — that I think there is a 
moral and temperance sentiment through this Commonwealth which is strong 
enough to enforce the law. 

Q. But not the same amount ? If I understood you, you stated that there 
was not the same amount ; that there are men who were held back and did 
not move, and now they do move; that there is not the same amount of senti- 
ment among a certain " higher class," you call them, in favor of enforcing this 
law, as there was for the enforcement of that. Why is this ? 

A. I have not said that, if I have understood myself. I said there was 
an unexpected effort on the part of a certain higher class, headed by Mr. Otis, 
to break down that law, just as there is, to my surprise, now, to defeat 
the present law ; but that I believed that for five or seven years after the 
repeal of that law, there was greater progress under the moral influences 
brought to bear upon the question by the " Cold Water Army," the reformed 
drunkards, and the temperance people, than at any other time, or than there 
is now ; but, as I said before, I believe there is now in this Commonwealth, 
and through the country, but especially in this Commonwealth, a power that 
would come up, on the enactment of a license law in this Commonwealth, as 
the loyal sentiment of the country came up when Sumpter was fired upon. 
It exists now, only it has been scattered. 

Q. After the repeal of the fifteen-gallon law, the hostility of the men 
you refer to — Harrison Gray Otis, and others — ceased, did it not ? 
A. Oh, it subsided. 

Q. They made no further active demonstrations ? 
71 



562 APPENDIX. 

A. It subsided. I always believed they were pushed into it, Mr. Child, 
and therefore there was a reason why they subsided. 

Q. Do you think there is anything to create a feeling against the execu- 
tion of this law, in the fact that it makes the seller only a criminal, not the 
drinker ? 

A- I don't see any objection to it on that account. I don't think there 
is any objection. 

Q. Is there any crime or wrong in selling liquor, if it be not drank ? 

A. The law don't make it so now, sir. 

Q. Is there any, in your opinion ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. It is an innocent act to sell ? 

A . Would be, to sell for proper purposes. 

Q. Can there be any wrong to the community, unless it be drank ? 

A. Well, if it is against the law, it is wrong ; but I don't see any moral 
wrono-. You were asking for sin. 

Q. I mean moral wrong ? 

A. No. 

Q. Is there any objection, in your idea, to the principle, when you would 
restrain an evil, of making the act criminal that don't produce the evil, and 
cannot produce it, and leaving the act that does produce it, in part, at least 
free from punishment ? 

A. That is a question which perhaps is not involved here, because we do 
punish the man who drinks. We don't punish him for buying. 

Q. You punish a man for selling, but if you drink a glass and do not get 
drunk, you are not punished ? 

A. Yes, sir. I would punish you for poisoning my spring ; I would not be 
punished for drinking the water. 

Q. That is a crime of one man against another, and not analogous at all. 
Is it wrong, in your opinion, in all cases and under all circumstances, to drink 
a glass of intoxicating liquor ? 

A. Yes, sir, if you mean by " all circumstances " a man in health. I think 
so, as a beverage. I think it is a sin. 

Q. A sin, per se f 

A. Yes, sir, per se. 

Q. Then you think it a sin, per se, for any man to drink a glass of wine ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Was it a sin eighteen hundred years ago for a man to drink a glass of 
wine ? 

A. Perhaps so, if he had the same light that we have now upon the 
matter. 

Q. Don't you think the Saviour of the world had upon this whole subject 
more light than all the rest of us ? 

A. I dare say. 

Q. If it was wrong for those people, at the marriage feast in Cana, to 
drink a glass of wine, would He have miraculously provided it ? 

A. Show me that it was intoxicating, and then I will draw my inference 
about it. 



APPENDIX. 563 

Q. Have you ever known any wine that was not intoxicating ? 

A. Yes, sir, a great deal. 

Q. What is it ? 

A. The juice of the grape, unfermented. 

Q. Is that a wine ? Can anybody drink it, any more than they could dish- 
water ? 

A. We call apple juice, before it is fermented, cider. I don't know 
why we should not call the unfermented juice of the grape, wine. 

Q. Wouldn't you convict a man for selling cider before it was fermented ? 

A. Yes, sir, because the law says cider. 

Q. Do you believe the law right ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Don't you believe it a sin for a man to drink it ? 

A. No, sir ; I don't. 

Q. We are upon the question of sin per se. You know very well the 
distinction between malum in se and malum prohibitum. Is it wrong per se to 
drink a glass of cider before fermentation ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then the law is the only thing that makes it wrong ? 

A. The law makes it wrong. 

Q. In regard to this matter of wine, will you be kind enough to state how 
you make it out that it is a sin per se for any one to drink a glass of wine ? 

A. I make it out in this way, Mr. Child. My knowledge upon the subject 
is this, that alcohol is indigestible, and that when a man takes it, he takes that 
which is an absolute injury to him. I hold that it becomes a sin in a man to 
take, that which he knows is going to hurt him, or that does not maintain his 
physical energies, as God has a right to expect him to do ; and whenever he 
takes that which will injure his physical, mental or moral power, knowing 
that that is to be the effect of it, however small, it is just so far, sin. 

Q. Then you make the sin per se of any act to depend upon the previously 
ascertained physiological effect that may follow the act ? 

A. Just as I make it out that it would be sin in a man to run a dagger 
into himself. That would be a sin. I have no right to destroy my life or 
injure my person. 

Q. There would be no doubt that that was an injury, but whether this 
glass of pure wine, or fermented wine, — because I do not understand that 
there is anything else called wine, — would injure you, is a question. 

A. That is arbitrary, to say that there is no wine except that which is 
fermented. 

Q. Is not that the same word which is contained in the New Testament, 
and in Homer, when he describes the bacchanalian revels ? 

A . Precisely. 

Q. Don't the Saviour of the world use the same word ? 

A. Very well. I make the distinction in cider. I say the unfermented 
juice of the apple is called cider, just as we call the unfermented juice of the 
grape, wine. 

Q. By what process can you preserve the common juice of the grape beyond 
a day or two, without fermentation taking place ? 



564 APPENDIX. 

A. Only in the form of what is called petmez. 

Q. What is that ? 

A. The juice is evaporated by the heat of the sun, or, more generally, by 
boiling. It is a process known in Palestine. They boil it, and reduce it to a 
sort of molasses, — what they call petmez. That was imported from abroad 
for many years, to be extended by water again, for the communion service, so 
as to have the unfermented juice of the grape. 

Q. Do you call that wine ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you believe, as a matter of common sense, that any such sort of 
liquor was drank at the marriage in Cana ? 

A . " Wine " is a general term, and it covers all these varieties. It is wi ae. 

Q. (By Mr. Sherman.) You say the sin may consist in the consciousness 
of the man who drinks it ? 

A. Yes, sir ; his consciousness of the physiological fact that it must injure 
him. 

Q. Then, if I drink coffee to excess, and am conscious that the second or 
third cup is going to injure me, don't I commit the same sin ? 

A. Yes, sir, to you. 

Q. Suppose that to-day, at dinner, I, as an individual, debate between two 
or three cups of strong coffee, knowing it will hurt me, and one glass of cider, 
believing it will do me good. In such a case, should I sin the more by drink- 
ing the cider or the coffee ? I have an honest belief in the one case that the 
cider would do me good ; I have as honest a belief in the other that the coffee 
would do me harm. 

A. In the one case, I should think you had informed yourself, and there- 
fore had come to the conclusion that the coffee was hurting you. In the other, 
I should consider it sinful in you not to inform yourself that the alcohol would 
injure you. 

Q. But suppose I had informed myself, as I supposed, and believed that 
the cider would do me good, and was honest in the belief that I had so 
informed myself? 

A. Well, sir, I think if you had cultivated your powers to the greatest 
extent, and been honestly trying to ascertain the truth, that it would not be 
charged against you. I think it would not be sin if you did the best you 
could about it. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I would like to inquire of you, as a man of learning 
and historical research, (which I know to be the fact,) if you know that wine, 
during the whole history of the Jewish nation, was used at their Paschal 
feasts ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you not know that it was the common wine of the country, which 
was a grape-growing country, that was used there ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When the Saviour of the world instituted the sacrament of the Lord's 
Supper, do you imagine that this process of making petmez was resorted to 
to get something to drink on that occasion, or did they take the common 
wine of the country ? 



APPENDIX. 565 

A. I don't feel capable of explaining a miracle. 

Q. I am not asking you to. At the Passover, the common wine of the 
country had been used by the Jews for a thousand years, in their Paschal 
feasts, and the Saviour then established the Lord's Supper, by administering 
wine. I ask you if you have any reason to suppose that a process had been 
resorted to to get an article called petmez, to be used on that occasion, or 
whether you suppose it was the common wine, such as had been used at the 
Paschal feasts ? 

A. I am by no means sure that the wine on that occasion was not squeezed 
by the hand from the grape. 

Q. Is there any reason to suppose so ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Why ? 

A. It was the common way of getting wine from the grape, by squeezing 
it. There is no way of knowing how they got it. 

Q. Did they not have wine-presses ? 

A. They trampled it out, expressed it by the feet, and expressed it at the 
table by hand. 

Q. Was not the cultivation of the vine and the use of the wine-press a 
common thing in the Saviour's time in Palestine ? 

A. Yes, sir, I have no doubt of it ; I have no doubt wine was fermented 
I have no doubt people drank too much of it ; and I have no doubt that the 
use of wine in that form had become so prevalent a sin that it was proclaimed 
in the gospel that drunkards cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. There 
must have been enough to make drunkards. 

Q. Does it say the man who drinks a glass of wine shall not enter the 
kingdom of heaven ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Is there any denunciation in the New Testament against drinking a 
glass of wine ? 

A. It only says that one who has offended in the least point is guilty of all. 

Q. Is the drinking of a glass of wine anywhere denounced in the New 
Testament as a sin ? 

A. There is something said about wine being " red in the cup." 

Q. Now, Judge, in a matter where the attempt is made by criminal law 
to change the drinking habits of the people, is it not necessary, in order to 
give any efficiency to such a law, that it should be sustained by public 
opinion ? 

A. I think it is well. 

Q. Can any good result unless it is ? 

A. Yes, sir, I think it can. I think there is great moral power in a law 
of prohibition against any iniquity, any vice. If it remains on the statute 
book without being enforced, I think there is great moral power in it. I think 
there is a moral power involved in its being there. 

Q. Is there an equal moral power in anything upon the statute book per- 
mitting a thing, to sanction it ? Is there a moral power in that, as well as in 
prohibiting ? 



566 APPENDIX. 

A. No, sir, I think not. I think it is a great deal better to prohibit 
houses of assignation than to license them, as I see there is a movement to 
license them in another city. 

Q. In your opinion, was not the efficiency of the prohibitory law, as it 
practically existed after the repeal of the fifteen-gallon law, owing to the fact 
that it was annually maintained by the voluntary action of the people in 
choosing men who were opposed to licensing ? 

A. I have no doubt that had a good influence. 

Q. Suppose you had the same thing now, and gave liberty to such cities 
and towns as pleased to permit the sale, under very stringent restrictions, and 
then, if they refused to permit the sale, retained the present law, with all its 
machinery, in force, — how would that do ? Would it not operate better than 
the present law ? 

A. It would undoubtedly stir up the community to make the best of it, 
and to prevent the sale ; but I think it is an unnecessary labor, an unnecessary 
work. 

Q. Suppose that this law should be merely modified, so that cities and 
towns might permit tavern-keepers to furnish it to their guests, and druggists 
in the way of their calling for family purposes, and grocers, not to be drunk 
on the premises, with no public bars allowed in taverns, and the prohibitory 
law in full force against all who violate these provisions, and the question 
whether they will have even that left to cities and towns, would it not be 
better than the present law ? 

A. I think not. I think it would accumulate the difficulties in the way of 
enforcing it. If we have a license law, or any law whatever, it is to be 
enforced by the same men who have enforced the law before. The men who 
have appeared before this Committee in favor of a license law are not the 
men to enforce a law. 

Q. We are to have the State Constabulary, are we not ? 

A. Who are the State Constabulary to stand upon but the old temperance 
men ? They are not standing upon the men who have been here. 

Q. You are not going to abandon the temperance reform ? 

A. I will not abandon it under any law. 

Q. You are going to stand by ? 

A. I am going to stand by. 

Q. You say such a law was better then ; why won't it be now ? 

A. I say it is an unnecessary labor. 

Q. Is there any other reason ? 

A. The accumulated difficulties in enforcing it. 

Q. Won't you explain what those " accumulated difficulties " are ? 

A. You say you are to have no open bar. Then when a man is drunk, 
you have got to find out where he got his liquor. It increases the difficulty. 

Q. One provision is, that the Mayor and Aldermen, or whoever gives a 
license, shall have the privilege of revoking it, without giving any reason to 
anybody. What is the difficulty of enforcing such a law, if the people will 
put men in to enforce it ? 

A. I would rather have it in my own hands than in those of the Mayor. 
I don't want to throw the responsibility on the mayor. I think the people 



APPENDIX. 567 

will carry it out better than the men who are elected by the people in doubt- 
ful places. 

Q. It will depend entirely upon the action of the people whether there is 
any liquor sold or not ? 

A. Yes, sir. But then we know that in the war we were obliged to lay 
aside temperance candidates for loyal candidates. We could not raise the 
question at the ballot-box. 

Q. The war has passed, hasn't it ? 

A. I know ; ,1 am only illustrating by that. 

Q. You would in that way have the same machinery and the same power 
that you have now, and you would have the public sentiment aroused and 
sharpened every year ? 

A. My idea is this : that if the old temperance men are to run the machine, 
whatever it is, they should choose their own machine, and not have one put 
into their hands by men who don't want a machine at all. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) I would like to inquire whether you see any 
difficulty in submitting this question to the people of the towns every year ? 
"Whether it would be better than to have a law which would operate uniformly 
throughout the State ? 

A . I think it would be better to have a uniform law, and one that would 
not be up and down according to the whims or political influence of localities. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) If I understand you, you say that the temperance 
men should have a law to satisfy themselves. You think that that portion of 
the people who think there is not wisdom in this law should not be consulted 
at all. Give you a law, and you will execute it. Do you mean that ? 

A. I mean this, sir : that while those men will not come out and identify 
themselves particularly with this cause, they should not come out and throw 
hindrances in the way of those who have surveyed the whole field, and think 
they understand the topic, and the means of bringing about the end better 
than retired men, who have not looked at it. 

Q. Then your idea is, that you and your temperance friends know better 
about this than other men ? 

A. Yes, sir ; just as manufacturers know better about their business than 
I do. 

Q. And others should have nothing to do with it ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not say they should have nothing to do with it. I think 
it follows that those who have watched the temperance enterprise forty years, 
know better what is necessary than those who have cared nothing about it. 

Q. And you are unwilling that those men should have any voice ? 

A. No, sir. If they will come in and say that they are a privileged class, 
and want further accommodations, I will grant them. 

Q. You mean to say, that those men who are opposed to a prohibitory law 
should not have any voice in the business of passing a law to be executed upon 
the whole people — that their sentiments should not be consulted at all ? 

A. No, sir, I don't say that. They have the same right to come here 
that I have ; but I understand they are in the minority. 



568 APPENDIX. 

Q. There are certain classes in the community who are opposed to this 
prohibitory law and its working, and would like some modification. You 
think they should not have any voice in making the law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You would not modify it at all to accommodate their views ? 

A. Only as I have suggested. 
• Q. You speak of the great moral efforts at the present time by the Sons 
of Temperance and other societies. Are those secret societies ? 

A. I cannot answer, because I have never been in them. I am one of the 
old temperance standards. 

Q. Are their efforts, whatever they are, open and before the public ? 

A. I see accounts of them in The Nation. I know they exist with us, and 
I know they hold their meetings. 

Q. Do they hold meetings- that are open to the public, or are they 
private ? 

A . For aught I know, all get in who go. 

Q. Do they advertise their meetings, and invite the public to come ? 

A. I believe they call their meetings as all other temperance meetings are 
called. I have more or less knowledge of them by having persons who are 
brought into my court charged with drunkenness, say they will go and join 
the Sons of Temperance, if we will let them go. We let them off, and they 
go and join the society. I only know that the society is in existence. 

Q. And their proceedings are not public ? 

A. I don't know anything about their proceedings. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Brother Child has asked you several questions, 
taking it for granted that public opinion is not up to the enforcement of this 
law. Now, is it not a fact, that public opinion all the time has been call- 
ing for the enforcement of this law, — temperance men, moderate drinkers, 
and all the people, except the liquor-sellers ? 

A . I can say this, that I have attended many of the quarterly meetings of 
the Temperance Alliance in my district. They are almost always devising 
ways to enforce the law ; and, as I said at the outset, I think there is now a 
concentration of public sentiment, and of the various forces that have been scat- 
tered heretofore, to enforce this law. I think all the forces we have put from 
time to time into the field will now combine, because they take encourage- 
ment from the fact that the decisions of the courts are in our favor. 

Testimony of Hon. Joseph White. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You know the question is whether we shall have 
a license law as a substitute for the present prohibitory law. I should like 
your experience upon that question. 

A. It is a pretty broad question. So far as my own feelings, convictions 
and judgment are concerned, I am in favor of letting the law stand. If any 
modifications are to be made in it, so make them as to make it more easy of 
execution. According to my judgment, the law is but the expression of the 
moral conviction of a majority of the people of Massachusetts, and therefore 
stands on good ground. It has not been executed as some hoped it would be 
executed. I never expected the law would run perfectly under twenty years. 



APPENDIX. 569 

I supposed it would take twenty years to make a law that would operate as 
freely as a law against theft or other offences against society which had been 
longer acknowledged than this one of the temptation to dram-drinking. But 
I believed the time would come when the law would be respected and would 
operate freely and to a large measure fully throughout the State. I believe 
it now. Being founded in what I conceive to be the moral convictions of the 
people of this Commonwealth, and being the only thing which the people* 
after forty years of effort, have found to be good for anything on the statute 
book, I think they are disposed to try it until that question is settled. We 
have lived under a license system, we and our fathers, from the Puritans down 
to a recent period ; and, as I understand, the movement against dram-drinking 
in the country, which went just about as far as it could go, reaching a vast 
majority of the people between the two extremes, was stopped (if it was 
stopped at all) by the fact that the men who had been drunkards and were 
converted were bowled down by the men who wanted to sell, and the new 
generation that was coming up was constantly in the way of temptation to the 
formation of habits which were contrary to the feelings and opinions and 
practices of their fathers. I do not believe you can make a temperate com- 
munity unless the principles which underlie temperate action are embodied in 
law. Law is the natural and proper expression, among a free people, of their 
convictions with reference to all matters that touch social life, where social 
life and political life unite ; and political life is nothing but the right arm of 
social life, to protect it. I am not much acquainted with the social habits of 
Boston, although I live here, but I live at the State House. I know something 
about the country, and the country, with the exception of its imported citizens, 
is substantially a sober country, and does not want this law changed, else I 
am exceedingly mistaken ; and wherever the authorities of a town are disposed 
in earnest to enforce the law, they succeed. Now let me give you an instance. 
Take Pittsfield, which has been characterized, as I understand, by Dr. Todd, 
and therefore I will not take the responsibility here of characterizing it. We 
held our county fair there three days. I was told by one of the leading men 
of our town, that a day or two before the fair, the Selectmen passed round 
among the drinking-places, and said, " Shut up ! We won't have you open 
for these three days ! " And they shut up. That shows that when men are 
determined to do it, they can do it. In that county, while attending fairs and 
commencement exercises, it is the rarest thing in the world for me to see an 
intoxicated man, except imported men, who are almost all, since Father 
Mathew died, drinking men. 

I need not state, what has been so often stated by men who know better 
than I do, the hindrances which the law has met with in its execution ; — just 
such as were to be expected ; just such as would be met with by any law. It 
is a criminal law in its nature, and all doubts are taken in favor of the accused, 
whenever an indictment is to be picked in pieces, or whenever a jury is to 
act ; and every possible question that can be raised, or nearly every one, it 
would seem, has been raised in court ; but one after another these objections 
have been eliminated, until now the law has got into a position where, if the 
people will, they can execute it. That is the question — whether they will 
or not. 

72 



570 APPENDIX. 

I think, in regard to this matter, (for I have no very particular statements 
to make,) that the men who had been active men in the temperance cause, 
who had done more than any others to produce this state of feeling in the 
community, (if I may express it in this way,) when this law was passed, lay 
over upon it. They seemed to have an idea that the law would execute 
itself. I think they made a great mistake. I think the various attempts 
which were made to resist its operation, whenever there was a thorough effort 
to enforce it, were obstacles in the way of its execution. I think, again, that 
the law was not executed as it should have been executed, from the fact that 
the men who undertook to execute it looked to the citizens to become informers. 
Like any other law, it is the business of the men who have charge of the 
police to execute it, and not to go to the citizens and make informers of them. 
That is where I think people have made a mistake. They say, " You temper- 
ance men should execute the law." It is the business of the men appointed 
by the proper authorities to be the guardians of the social state to execute the 
law, and they have no business to roll that responsibility off upon anybody 
else. Another reason why it has not been executed is because we have not 
been impartial. The good book says, " My ways are equal ; your ways are 
not equal." We have attempted to execute the law by going down into Ann 
Street and taking up the little rum-sellers, instead of making the law so ope- 
rate that there should be no distinction of persons or places. I think that has 
been one of the faults. I think that has arisen, not so much from a want of 
moral conviction of the justness of the law, as from moral cowardice on the 
part of the people in regard to making that law what it ought to be, and 
enforcing it equally. This community, or any community, may have a moral 
conviction which sustains a law, which holds it to be right, and yet there may 
be a fear that it is not quite right for me or for any one to do anything in the 
execution of it, and thus the law may be paralyzed. 

In the town where I have resided since 1860, — Williamstown, — which I 
have known for forty years, there were some five or six barns burned during 
the summer of the first year I was there. There were two or three bad secret 
places — apparently secret — but there were one or two men with nerve enough 
to take the risk of having their barns burned, and they broke them up, and 
now there is not more than one place where liquor is sold, and there is a ques- 
tion about that. But this should be said : we are a border town ; it is not a 
great ways to Troy, and it is not a great ways to Pittsfield. I don't know 
how much comes in on the railroad, but the people, as compared with what 
they were when I was in college, thirty-four years ago, are a temperate peo- 
ple — the farmers and business men ; and in our community (we are a country 
people, of course), a man would be discredited who should offer wine to his, 
neighbors at the choicest dinner he could get up. It is not so here, but it is 
there. 

Q. In the exercise of your duties, you go about the State a good deal ? 

A. Considerably, sir. 

Q. Is not the feeling very strong in favor of the law, and in favor of its 
enforcement ? Is not the inquiry made, " Why don't they enforce it down 
in Boston ? " and in various parts of the State ? 

A. I hear that question put, sir, very often indeed. 



APPENDIX. 571 

Q. Do they not take a great deal of courage from the operation of the 
State Constabulary ? 

A. I hear them everywhere spoken in favor of, except that once in a while 
I hear it whispered that some gentleman of that staff is so very polite as to 
give notice to the rum-sellers the day before he calls on them officially. I 
have heard of one or two instances of that kind. As a general thing, I think 
they are relied upon. 

Q. Do they not have more hope now than they have had for a good while 
of its enforcement ? 

A. I think so, from what I hear and see. 

Q. Have you any remarks to make on this subject, as connected with the 
education of the people ? 

A. Well, sir, the Board which I serve confines itself exclusively to its 
proper work, and I, as their servant, confine myself to it as exclusively as I 
can. I have never allowed myself to speak on any subject that was before 
the Legislature here, and I should not now, if I had not been invited by you, 
sir, or by the Committee. I deal with the children of the Commonwealth, 
and I believe it is important that there should be no place of temptation for 
children. So far as I am concerned, therefore, I should be opposed to having 
anything done which would lend the slightest shade of additional respect to 
this business, or make the obtaining of liquor any more easy than it is now. 

Q. You have seen, perhaps, the plan of a law which has been presented 
by the petitioners ? 

A. I have heard it spoken of. I read it the morning after it was presented 
here, and it was shown to me this morning. As I understand it, the main part 
of it is in the first section, which proposes that each municipality shall settle 
the question entirely for itself. I have some objections to that, if gentlemen 
will excuse me for expressing them. One is, that it ceases to be a State law. 
I believe that in all matters of this kind, our ways, as I have said, should be 
equal. It ceases to be a State law, and is simply a permission to every town to 
settle this matter for itself. We, in Williamstown, would vote not to have it. 
No man could be elected there, with a college on our hands, who was not 
opposed to it. But if the selectmen of the town of Adams, four and a half 
miles off, should vote to allow places to be opened, those of our people who 
go to North Adams to market would, perhaps, make more frequent visits. 
They would get their liquor there. You may have one town temperate and 
another intemperate. While an annual discussion keeps the matter before 
the people and makes excitement, it makes an unpleasant excitement, as 
everybody knows. It strikes me that the question of giving power to the 
selectmen to execute the law, as it stands, opens a sufficiently broad field for 
discussion, and all that we need. 

Q. Would you not consider it unjust for one town to set up these places 
when another town on its border refuses to allow them ? 

A. It would be unpleasant. 

Q. Would it not nullify the law ? 

A. Certainly. Whether it would be unjust or not would depend upon the 
law. We find that the men who want to drink in our town slip across the 
line. Our neighbors in Vermont allow one or two places to be kept there. 



572 APPENDIX. 

I mean the lower class of men, — the imported men, who have not money 
enough to send to Troy for it. 

A. One other question. This plan of a bill contemplates the giving 
of licenses every year by each municipality, if they see fit, and changing them 
every year. Aside from its inequality and injustice toward those towns 
which do not want liquor and vote not to have it, would not that raise up a 
multitude of legal questions that it would be impossible ever to settle ? You 
say it will take fifteen or twenty years to get this law all fixed and established. 
Would there not be a number of questions raised under this law, so numerous 
and so complicated as to be altogether beyond settlement ? 

A. I understand that this plan contemplates leaving the present law in 
force against all those who do not get licenses. I do not see, therefore, how it 
could raise any legal questions, so far as that class of persons are concerned. 
If any new questions are to be raised, they are to be raised on modifications 
of the law. I should look upon it in that light. 
Q. I mean where they do license ? 

A. Of course there would be questions, unless they could go back to the 
old decisions, when we had license laws. My ground of objection to the law 
is not that so much as the fact that we do not want three hundred and thirty- 
four independent States in Massachusetts to settle questions of this kind ; and 
I want selectmen elected, as far as possible, in reference to the ordinary duties 
of selectmen. I have always been in favor of keeping this question, as far as 
possible, out of the region of e very-day, common, town, State or national pol- 
itics. I never have been disposed to carry it into politics, except when it 
was necessary in order to get the law strong. 

Q. (By Mr. Sherman.) You think the best interests of the town in 
other respects might be overlooked by regarding simply this ? 

A. There would be likely to be a fight, for there is a strong anti-temper- 
ance feeling in many towns. In my town it was settled forty years ago ; 
every person who has sold liquor there since has sold it illicitly ; but there 
are other towns where this question would come up continually. If there is a 
majority in the Commonwealth in favor of any particular action, I am in favor 
of that majority putting their views upon the statute book, and letting them 
stand as the law of the State. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You say that you object to the towns being inde- 
pendent of the State and of each other in respect to this particular kind of 
police regulation — making three hundred and thirty-four independencies in 
the Commonwealth. Is it for that reason you desire that the State should 
undertake to regulate the action of the towns ? 

A. That is one reason, and an important reason in my mind. 
Q. Then you desire that the State should undertake to regulate the action 
of the people in respect of buying, selling, and consuming liquor ? 

A. Yes, sir. I think if a majority of the people are in favor of any par- 
ticular law in reference to this subject, as in reference to any other, its place 
is in the statute book. 

Q. As this is a matter which relates, not to the action of the citizen con- 
cerning the person or property of his neighbor, but relates only to the action 
of the citizen concerning himself, his own conduct, why would not the same 



APPENDIX. 573 

rule logically carry you to the extent of requiring the Commonwealth to 
destroy the independence of the families of the State, and introduce the 
legislation of Sparta ? 

A. My own view is this : The family is an institution of God from the 
beginning, and the object of the State is to take care of the family. The 
town is an institution of the State ; it is its creation ; it is not an original 
institution ; and the State may go on and take away from the town any rights 
which it, as a State, deems best for the general good. But I go further, and 
state that I do not admit your premise. I do not admit that this deals solely 
with the individual. We put the drunkard into prison because his drinking 
injures the family, destroys his producing power, and tends to make a pauper 
of him. My theory in regard to this law is just this : that the law is intended 
to prevent, (and I say I think it does in some measure prevent,) such practices 
in the community as have been proved, by universal experience, to injure the 
State — to produce pauperism, to produce crime — and for that reason the State 
has a right to take hold of it ; it is within its legitimate path ; and, in doing 
so, it does not interfere with the private opinions of myself or of my friend, 
the governor. 

Q. Does this prohibitory law, against which the petitioners are here 
moving, constitute drunkenness, for the first time, an offence ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Therefore, the misuse or abuse of a certain article of commerce was 
recognized and punished by law before this one was made ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Has this law, then, any effect towards preventing that abuse, other 
than as it is an attempt to make it exceedingly difficult and inconvenient for 
people, in the exercise of their own freedom of judgment, to procure a certain 
commercial article ? 

A. It makes it very inconvenient, and that is one object of the law. 

Q. To make it more inconvenient for the people of Massachusetts to obtain 
an article of commorce ? 

A. My own view with regard to it was, (I am a younger man than Ju3ge 
Crosby, who grew up in this movement,) that the body of the people, certainly 
in this State, felt that to conduct a business the natural and direct tendency 
of which was to produce drunkenness, out of which flow so many evils, was 
in itself a sufficient ground of offence to put it under the ban of the law to a 
certain extent. This matter has been the subject of regulation from the 
earliest time. Our Puritan fathers used to send a man with a long pole 
through the streets at nine o'clock, to shut up the places where " strong 
water" was sold. So far as that precedent is concerned, I understand that 
the present proposed modification does not take the law from under it. We 
propose to do just what the fathers did — to regulate it. You propose to do 
that. 

Q. Then you regard this law as advantageous in two respects. First, it is 
advantageous because it makes it exceedingly inconvenient for the citizen to 
obtain a certain commercial article ; and, secondly, because it bears a moral 
testimony ? 



574 APPENDIX. 

A. I think that is one reason. I think it expresses the moral sentiment of 
the people. 

Q. Is the law satisfactory in that respect ? 

A. I think it is satisfactory to the majority of the people. 

Q. Is it to yourself and the class of men who agree with you in sentiment, 
satisfactory in that respect, as a preacher of righteousness ? 

A. I think it is, in the main ; as far as it preaches. 

Q. Are you satisfied with it as it stands ? 

A. I should like to have it more thoroughly executed. 

Q. I mean, are you satisfied with the law as it stands upon the statute 
book? 

A. I am satisfied with the principle of the law. I may not be familiar 
with all its details, because I have not spent any time in studying it. 

Q. [Reading.'] " The County Commissioners and the Mayor and Alder- 
men of the city of Boston, on the first Monday of May annually, or as soon 
thereafter as practicable, may authorize such persons as apply to them in 
writing, to manufacture spirituous or intoxicating liquors at places within 
their respective jurisdictions, and to sell the same in quantities not less than 
thirty gallons, to be exported or to be used in the arts or for mechanical and 
chemical purposes in this State, and such authority shall continue for the term 
of one year from the time thereof, unless sooner revoked for cause, or annulled 
as hereinafter provided." {Sect. 12.) Is that, in your opinion, a consistent 
testimony in behalf of moral principle — that persons may make these intoxi- 
cating liquors for all the rest of creation, and poison whoever they please ? 

A. I don't think it is, Governor. I don't know that anything else can be 
substituted in its place that is better, but I don't think that provision is a 
particularly strong moral testimony against selling liquor or manufacturing it. 

Q. Then the law recedes, does it not, from its high stand-point of being a 
moral testimony in behalf of moral principle, and confines itself to the 
original position which I first mentioned, that of attempting to make it 
exceedingly inconvenient for the citizen to obtain a commercial article ? 

A. It does in that respect. 

Q. Is there anything else that occurs to you as objectionable ? 

A. I have not read the law. 

Q. Are you in favor of drinking wine ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Under any circumstances ? 

A. Well, I don't believe that wine is necessary; I am not in favor of it. 
I should drink it at the communion, if offered to me, without inquiring as to 
the quality. 

Q. You don't regard fermented wine as objectionable ? 

A. Not in that respect. 

Q. When used for the sacred commemorative service ? 

A. If you will allow me to state, my whole ground of action ever has 
been, in regard to temperance and intemperance, total abstinence from the 
use of intoxicating drinks as a beverage. I don't believe in them " as a steady 
drink," as the common expression is ; and my strong ground in favor of total 
abstinence (for when I was a youpg man, I listened to all those discussions, 



APPENDIX. 575 

and mingled in them,) was not so much that a single glass of wine was objec- 
tionable, as the other ground, which was always satisfactory to me, and I 
think that is the ground on which a majority of the people have acted, that it 
was found to be utterly impossible to induce men who loved whiskey to stop 
whiskey-drinking from the lips of men who loved wine and drank wine ; and 
therefore, to be consistent, we must take the principle of St. Paul on that subject. 
I remember a most thorough discussion on this subject which took place at Sar- 
atoga Springs, between Bishop Potter, one of the noblest men that ever lived, 
and Governor Briggs — one in favor of total abstinence and the other opposed 
to it. Bishop Potter was then a distinguished Professor at Union College. He 
was conscientious in the position he took — believed in it. Subsequently, he 
wrote a letter to some gentlemen in Boston, which I read more than twenty 
years ago, in which he said that he found he could not preach temperance 
effectively to the students of Union College so long as they knew that he 
drank wine ; and therefore, although he believed that the Bible sanctioned 
the use of wine, he abandoned it, to give his teachings higher moral power. 
It is on that ground that I have been in favor of total abstinence. 

Q. That is a matter of personal observation and conviction ; but you do 
not mean to say that that is a principle upon which criminal legislation should 
be based, do you ? 

A. I think that criminal legislation is based upon substantially the same 
thing. It is on the general observation of the fact that to open places to 
tempt the young and unwary, or to make it easy for those who have acquired 
the habit of drinking to get liquor, to give it a sort of respectability, to 
insinuate liquor through the social nature of man, is an evil. I think that is 
the evil of dram-selling, and the main object of the law, I suppose, was to stop 
that. 

Q. The main object was to stop dram-selling ? 
A. Yes, sir. I class under that jug-selling. 

Q. You are not opposed to a law allowing anybody who pleases to sell 
to the deacon, with an understanding how he is going to use it ? 

A. No, and I think that is provided for by law. But I don't want the 
deacon to go to a store where the boys will get round and take a drink at his 
expense, and laugh at him when his back is turned. 

Q. Are you not aware that the law which forbids everybody, except State 
Agents, selling wine, allows everybody to sell the same wine to the deacon for 
sacramental purposes ? That, you understand, to be the law ? 
A. Yes, I believe it is. 

Q. Therefore, I again ask you, if you think this law is itself so commend- 
able as a preacher of an abstract rule of righteousness, when it allows men 
to sell an article to anybody, upon the understanding that he is to devote 
it to a particular social, yet sacred, purpose, while at the same time it forbids 
them to sell to anybody for any other purpose ? 

A. Well, I think that so far as the law restricts it to that good purpose, it 
is so far good. 

Q. Then you admit that it is properly useable in the celebration of the 
sacrament of the Lord's Supper ? 



576 APPENDIX. 

A. I have never taken the ground that others have, that the use of wine 
at the communion table is wrong. I should prefer using the unfermented 
wine. 

Q. And the law does not take that ground ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You alluded, in your testimony-in-chief, to the fact of the existence of 
a highly commendable and satisfactory moral condition in respect to sobriety 
in your own favored town of Williamstown ? 

A. I did not use the word " favored ; " but it is, in that respect, somewhat 
favored, although it had great disadvantages. There was more drunkenness 
in the town, when I first knew it, than in any town I ever knew. At the 
present time, I do not know of a man in Williamstown who is a drunkard. 
All our farming population, except one or two, who came down from the old 
generations, now sixty or seventy years of age, are temperance men. 

Q. And you are not sure there is any place in town where liquor can be 
obtained ? 

A. I don't know of one in our town, except the apothecary. 

Q. But you think they sell it over the line, both in New York and in 
Vermont ? 

A. They don't sell it in the border towns over the line in New York, but 
Troy is only about thirty miles distant from us by rail. 

Q. How is it in North Adams ? Don't rum run pretty freely in North 
Adams ? 

A . I have heard so. Judge Robinson is here, and he can testify as to 
that. 

Q. Then, on three sides, your people have pretty free trade ? 

A. Yes, sir. That is to say, on two sides, certainly, they can find it. 

Q. And unless North Adams has changed very much recently, it is so 
there ? 

A. I shouldn't wonder. 

Q. Then, on three sides of your town, liquor can be bought by everybody 
whenever they please ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that has always been so ? 

A. Yes, sir. « • 

Q. And yet, in spite of that, your people have been brought up to their 
present condition of temperance and sobriety. Now, what has done it ? 

A. In the first place, with reference to your statement, there are only two 
sides of the town on which the poor drunkard can get anything, if he can get 
it at Adams, because the border towns in New Yort; are more free from it 
and more strongly temperate than Williamstown itself; and that which has 
brought temperance up there has been the strong public sentiment which has 
gone out from the people of that town in favor of abstinence from drink. 

Q. The education of the minds of the people ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And encouraging them to pursue a better way ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



APPENDIX. 577 

Q. And that has been the success of your people in Williamstown thus 
far? 

A . We were very early favored in that respect. I remember attending a 
town meeting as many as thirty-three years ago, where this question of 
licensing came up, and it was discussed with tremendous energy from midday 
until night, and finally settled against it. They agreed to license one man, 
and that was the celebrated geological professor, Dr. Emmons, of that 
town, to sell to anybody he saw fit ; and I remember he said, " I won't have 
the cursed thing in my house. I don't see fit to sell it to anybody ; it isn't 
fit for anybody to have. Nobody wants it ; it won't do anybody any good, 
and I won't have it." That settled the question. There has been no attempt 
to get a license since. 

Q. Whatever the law in Massachusetts may be, so far as geographical 
position is concerned, the town of Williamstown would always be exposed ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And she depends upon the moral force and intelligence of her people 
to resist the temptation ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now, depending upon that moral force and moral education and intel- 
ligence of her citizens, she has risen to what she is ? 

A . Yes, sir. I think it is proper to state that, depending upon that moral 
force, she has absolutely excluded the sale of rum, as far as she could. That 
exclusion she has used as an instrument for thirty-three years. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you know whether two of the faculty of Wil- 
liams College have been appointed a committee to prosecute under this law ? 

A. I know that one has. He has always been the efficient man, who has 
had nerve enough to drive that matter through. 

Q. Gov. Andrew has called your attention to that section of the law which 
permits the manufacture of the article and its importation to other States, and 
asked your judgment of its propriety and consistency ? 

A. I think he asked my judgment whether it was a perfect expression of 
the moral sentiment of the Commonwealth. 

Q. Put it in that shape if you please ; but allow me to ask you another 
question. You know that a large portion of the liquor manufactured in this 
country is used in the arts, I suppose ? 

A. I suppose so ; I don't know. 

Q. It was testified by Mr. Derby the other day, that he was on a com- 
mission at Washington, and they found that more than half the alcohol and 
the various kinds of whiskey manufactured in this country, was used in the 
arts. I suppose you do not disapprove of its use for that purpose ? 

A. No, sir, I do not disapprove of its use in the arts. I do not disapprove, 
for I do not pretend to know anything about it. In the line of medicine, if a 
physician directed me to take it, I should take it ; and I will say, that if I was 
attacked in the night with cholic, and could get hold of some brandy, I should 
take it, if I supposed it would do me good. 

Q. You admit the propriety of its use in the arts and for medicine, and it 
has been testified that more than half the quantity manufactured in this 
73 



578 APPENDIX. 

• 

country is used in the arts. It is right and proper to manufacture and sell it 
for those purposes, of course ? 

A. I do not doubt that. 

Q. Then does not that, in your view, make it proper for Massachusetts to 
allow its manufacture to be sent into other States, and take its chances 
whether it shall be used in the arts or otherwise, leaving it to those States to 
regulate its sale and use as they may think proper ? 

A . It may be best, on the whole, as a matter of expediency, to make a law 
of that kind ; but I do not quite see the moral effect of sending it into another 
State, any more than I do of sending it from one town to another. 

Q. You cannot suppose that the State of Massachusetts can control the 
distribution of it for various purposes in other States ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q: It is legal and proper to manufacture it, is it not, Mr. White ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Of course, it must be manufactured by somebody ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. On the whole, can you see any better way to do it ? 

A. I cannot see any better way to do it. I wish to be understood that I 
base my objection to the license system on the ground that I think the pro- 
hibitory system will take liquor more effectually out of the way of tempting 
people to drink it. I do not go into the metaphysics of the thing at all. 

Testimony of Rev. E. P. Marvin, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are editor of the Boston Recorder, are you ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Where is your residence ? 

A. In Medford. 

Q. Your business is in Boston ? 

A. In Boston. 

Q. You are a member of the Trinitarian Congregationalist order ? 

A. Yes, sir ; and my paper is a denominational paper. 

Q. Your paper takes what ground on the subject under discussion here, 
and under some general discussion ? You may state your views and those of 
your church and patrons on this subject ? 

A. We take the ground that the prohibition of the sale of liquor for a 
beverage is exactly what is desirable, or rather that the licensing of the sale, 
so that it may be used for drinking purposes, is an immorality ; that is, that 
there is a great moral question at the foundation of it, agitating the churches 
of the several denominations and the masses of the people to such an extent 
that it can never be settled, in my judgment, until the responsibility is taken 
off from the people ; and our objection to the license is this, mainly : that it 
takes the moral responsibility off from the individuals, in a measure, and lays 
it upon the whole people. That is the very thing that the churches and the 
people Avill never endure. If a man sells to his neighbor, who drinks and 
injures himself, the man who sells has that responsibility himself, and he is 
accountable to the law. Whether the law is enforced or not, he is responsi- 
ble ; but the moment we enact a license law we say for so much money we 



APPENDIX. 579 

will take the responsibility — the moral guilt, if you please — of that man's 
sales ; so that it becomes with all the churches a simple question of morality ; 
and the moral idea, the question of morality, weighs like a world upon the State 
as soon as it becomes stirred and agitated. I believe it was a moral idea that 
gave power to the Revolution ; a moral idea underlying the question, so that 
they would not endure the Stamp Act. And there was a moral idea that sus- 
tained the people in the last war. And so it is in this. We feel that we will 
never bear the responsibility which now lies upon those who sell for drinking 
purposes. We advocate that in our paper, and when questions come up which 
have been brought up here, which are questions of casuistry, we think that 
the masses of the people strike through them at once to the principal fact. 
They say that when there is a license there is an encouragement of the sale 
more or less general ; and that sale, more or less general, is always evil and 
always ruinous to many, and there is a responsibility somewhere. Now, then, 
if the State enacts that the people, the churches and the ministers, and the 
different classes of people are to bear this responsibility (for we constitute 
a part of the State, and their Legislature represents us), we say that we never 
can submit to the idea that the people and the churches shall license the sale, 
where it is known to be used with such deleterious effect. The question is 
often answered by such passages o£ Scripture as this. It was said in Leviticus, 
that if an ox was wont to push with his horn, and his owner did not keep him 
in, so that he gored a man or a woman that they died, the ox should be killed 
and the owner thereof should be put to death. Now there is no harm in the 
ox being in the street ; but when it becomes known to the owner that he may 
one time in ten thousand, even, destroy or injure somebody, if he does not 
restrain him he is responsible for the crime of murder. In case a man should 
be killed, he is the murderer. Now, in this case it has become known to the 
people, and it is preached in the churches — and there is a unanimity in the 
churches, or of a large majority of them, on this question — that the sale for 
drinking purposes is sure to kill. It destroys peace among families ; it makes 
widows and orphans ; it fills homes with tears and sorrow ; and there is a 
responsibility somewhere. Even if the prohibitory law could not be enforced, 
it would be far better to have it there than to take the responsibility off from 
those who wish to sell, and put it upon the whole of us. There is the trouble, 
and I think almost anything else could be done to quiet the people of Massa- 
chusetts better than to enact a license law ; siimply, on that ground. They had 
rather leave it to every man who wants to sell to take the responsibility, if he 
will, of selling and destroying ; but not put it on the people. Another reason 
why I am strongly in favor of a prohibitory law, and have advocated it in my 
paper, is that I think there is almost a universal concurrence among the mem- 
bers of the denomination to which I belong, in the opinion that the prohibi- 
tory law may encourage and strengthen morals. I believe there has been a 
reaction or falling back in the using of moral means. The people have been 
discouraged in this way. They say you have come to us, and have lectured 
to us and have brought a pledge and we have signed it a hundred times, and 
yet there are men who have defeated us. Now, they say, tell us something to 
do that will stop our children and the young people of our congregation from 
the use of liquor, and we will go on. Signing the pledge and having lectures 



580 APPENDIX. 

are good things ; but every time it rolls back upon the same trouble. It is 
like Ixion, rolling a stone over and over, forever. There is no cog to hold 
this wheel. The people demand that there shall be a law such that when we 
get up to a certain extent, instead of having it roll back and the law have no 
force, the law may be able to hold it. I think that if we had a law only one- 
half as strong within the last few years, which would have sustained public 
opinion, that we should have gained power and become stronger temperance 
people, an hundred-fold, than we are now. As to the enforcement of the 
law, it is known, I suppose, that when the law was passed, in a great many 
towns of the Commonwealth, it was easy to enforce it ; and in my belief those 
who did sell, did close up their shops, and they would do so again if it could 
become common ; but when they find that there is any other place resisting 
the law, they will continue the sale. The temperance movement lost, per- 
haps, a degree of moral courage and force by this change of affairs, and those 
who were accustomed to sell became emboldened, and they went back ; but 
if the law had been enforced, and if there had been no question to be carried 
up in the courts, I think it would have been enforced quite generally through- 
out the State. 

Q. You do not feel, then, on the whole, any discouragement such as would 
incline you to turn back from prohibition as to principle ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not at all, and as population increases and foreign popula- 
tion is increased, it is more and more demanded, for there is a class of people 
on whom moral suasion has about as much effect as water poured on a shark's 
back. You can effect, perhaps, ninety-nine hundredths, but the law will 
defeat you, unless you come to the support of all. 

Q. What do you think the sentiment of the people to be, in regard to the 
principle that the license law will restrain the sale of liquor. Is it felt that 
that is the intention of those who advocate that law ? 

A. We are disposed to make great allowances for differences of opinion, 
but, so far as I know, the people can hardly make up their minds that it is 
possible that anybody seriously intends by a license law really to restrain the 
sale. I have conversed with a great many persons, and they do not wish to 
charge bad motives to anybody, and they say that a great many of these 
persons really think to accomplish something by such a law ; and yet it is the 
toughest question for them to satisfy themselves that anybody really expects 
any restraint from a license law. I received, only last year, three letters from 
persons in different parts of the State (and from quite representative men in 
different classes of society in different parts of the State), all of them express- 
ing wonder that anybody can think that by a license there can be any 
restraint. And some of them express it in no measured terms, and I think 
there is amazement in my own denomination and perfect bewilderment in 
reference to this matter ; and it is very rare to find a man who thinks that by 
a license law there can be any real intention of restraint in the indulgence of 
drink. 

Q. And any claim or pretence that any testimony to the contrary as 
representing the sentiment of your people, is not a just one ? 

A. It is utterly repudiated by them. We have done it by whole churches 
since that time ; and whole associations of ministers, since there has been such 



APPENDIX. 581 

an imputation, are holding meetings and passing resolutions. And I think I 
am safe to say that ninety-nine out of every hundred would join in passing 
these resolutions. 

Q. Would you feel at liberty to name any churches ? 

A. The church in South Boston, I understand, passed such resolutions. I 
think it was last Sabbath. 

Q. Rev. Dr. Alden's church ? 

A. Yes, sir ; after a slight consultation at the close of the evening meeting, 
some persons expressed a wonder that such an impression could have been got 
by anybody, and wished that there should be an expression on the part of the 
church. And some expression was made by those who chose to remain at the 
meeting ; and nearly all who were present did remain. I have heard of one 
association of ministers : I might find the facts ; I do not know that I could 
give the names, but they have been published in the papers, and everybody 
can see them. 

Q. What, in your judgment, is the effect now being produced throughout 
your ranks by the proceedings here ? 

A. There is a wonderful interest. I went up to Andover since this Com- 
mittee has been in session, having an errand which led me to see the different 
professors of theology, and almost the first thing, after the usual salutation, 
was, " What in the world are you doing in Boston ? Are you really mooting 
that question again ? " And I had to go into an explanation in every place 
where I went, I believe without exception. I told them they had not read the 
testimony from the other side, and that, so far, it was only a representation of 
one view. And so I have found it in various places. I was in New York since 
that, and in places where I met representative gentlemen among those who 
agree with us in religious views, and I found many looking to Boston with 
great anxiety about this discussion. They will be influenced very much by 
the testimony here. I think the testimony is doing great good. It is arousing 
discussion among the people, and bringing out information. I feel a pleasure 
that those who, two or three years ago were somewhat in doubt whether it 
would not be better to have a license law, have changed their minds 
entirely. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you think that your illustration of the 
untamed ox has any real analogy to the matter in hand ? 

A. It was not an untamed ox in the first place. 

Q. Well, a wild, misbehaving ox, at any rate. Do you think it has any 
real analogy to the matter in hand ? 

A. Certainly ; I think it has. 

Q. The object of shutting up the ox was the same as the object which we 
undertake to accomplish in shutting up animals, wild by nature, was it not ? 

A. I understand that it was common to leave oxen to run in the streets 
and there was no harm at all generally ; and there was no moral wrong in an 
ox walking the streets : but when it is known that he is liable to do mischief, 
then the responsibility comes back upon the owner for the injury that he does. 
So I say in regard to the sale and use of liquor ; that it is known that the 
liquor will destroy, and that even if it is only known that it will destroy in 
one case out of fifty, whenever it does destroy the responsibility comes back 



582 APPENDIX. 

upon those who have not restrained it. It is nothing that they have not done 
anything about it. 

Q. Do you understand that the liquor itself has any power of volition or 
action in itself ? 

A. No, sir ; no great amount unless it is among those persons who are so 
full of it that you can hardly separate them from the liquor. 

Q. I put the question because you undertook to make an analogy between 
an inanimate object, incapable of doing any harm of its own accord, and an 
animal possessing both volition and active powers. 

A. I did not attempt any such thing. I attempted to show an analogy 
between the restraining of the ox, and the restraining of the sale of liquor. 
It is simply a restraint of that which a man knows will, in all probability, do 
evil. 

Q. Now, since you have apparently shifted your position from that which I 
understood you to take, let me address you upon the very ground you at this 
moment occupy. Do you understand that there is something like fifty 
millions of gallons of spirituous liquors of one sort and another of which 
alcohol is the basis, manufactured and sold in this country annually for man- 
ufacturing purposes and for use in the arts ? 

A. It may be so. 

Q. Well, sir ; when it is sold, it is out loose in the community, is it not ? 

A . It is out in the community in casks, I suppose. 

Q. Does it discourage the cause at all. 

A. It is not out in the community, if we have a prohibitory law. 

Q. But your prohibitory law allows the sale of just these very dangerous 
oxen, in medicine and in the arts ? 

A. Yes, sir ; the prohibitory law restrains it. It is like putting a hamper 
upon it. 

Q. Does it restrain the use after it is sold ? 

A. It restrains it in the State. 

Q. In the State after it is sold ? , 

A . It is not sold according to the prohibitory law. 

Q. Do you not understand that your own prohibitory law authorizes the 
sale of all these dangerous oxen ? 

A . Never, sir ; only while they are not dangerous. 

Q. Do you mean to say that it does not authorize the sale of Medford 
rum for use in the arts ? 

A. No, sir; I do not say that. 

Q. Then it is dangerous for use in the arts ? 

A. Certainly not. 

Q. Then the danger is not in the thing itself ; the danger is in a perverted 
use of it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Where, then, is your analogy ? 

A. The danger is not with the ox ; but when the ox gets in a disposition 
to make himself dangerous, then it is time to restrain him. 

Q. Is there any difference between the disposition of one barrel of 
whiskey and another ? 



APPENDIX. 583 

A. It is in the use made of it. 

Q. In the use made after the purchase is made ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think it is wholly there ; I. think that is simply taking 
the whole force of the restraint from it. In the first case, I think it would be 
perfectly right to sell an ox, and let him go in the street until it is known that 
he probably will do mischief. In certain streets and certain ways where peo- 
ple go, or entirely at large, he would be ruinous, and just so it is with the 
restraining of liquor in some streets and ways. In certain other streets and 
ways in which liquor may be bought, it may not be injurious ; but in these 
streets we want to stop it. 

Q. That is to say, you want to stop the perverting of the use of a thing 
which is utterly harmless so long as it is unper verted ? 

A. Simply what the law says ; we wish to prevent the sale for intoxicat- 
ing purposes and for beverages. 

Q. That is, you simply wish to prevent it where it is abusive ? Now, then, 
your analogy ceases plainly. 

A. Take another, then. Take a steam-boiler which becomes unsafe ; we 
at once come in with a law, not preventing the use of steam-boilers, but 
preventing men from using that particular boiler ; not preventing the use of 
steam-boilers in general, but the use of this in this particular way ; and saying 
that a man shall not undertake to carry a train over a road with an engine 
that has that steam-boiler, although that boiler may be very good for some- 
thing else. 

Q. That is, for old iron ? 

A. Yes, sir; for old iron or anything of that kind ; and anywhere where 
it can be used with caution. But here the law says that because it may do 
harm, it shall not be used. So here we want to say that drinking usages are 
very sure to run the train off, and therefore we will not have liquor used. 

Q. But you have got forty or fifty millions of gallons in the community, 
used for mechanical purposes, out of ninety or ninety-five millions of gallons 
which are manufactured annually in the country. It is in the community and 
in the hands of people of all descriptions ; and no sort of artist or artisan, of 
any description, who does not use it in some form or other. It gets pretty 
widely spread then, does it not ? 

A. Would you take the ground that because there is a good deal of this 
liquor out in the community for mechanical purposes, therefore it will be right 
to open places of temptation for the young ? 

Q. I will put the question back to you, sir. If there is a barrel of whiskey 
in a mechanic's shop, is not the whiskey itself just as tempting as if it were 
somewhere else ? 

A. No, sir; it might be very much more tempting somewhere else. 

Q. Now, do you question that there is a considerable amount of injurious 
drinking from the use of rum and whiskey bought of the State Agent for 
mechanical purposes ? 

A. It is possible that it may be sometimes abused. 

Q. You do not know of any instances ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then is it the ox that gores ? 



584 APPENDIX. 

A. It is the ox when it gores. 

Q. It is the man that gores the ox and not the ox that gores the man, is it 
not ? Do you not find that the sole restraining power of the people is that 
which we have to rely upon at the last, in respect to the use of liquor ? Is it 
not everwhere throughout the community in some form or other ? And do 
we not have to depend upon the judgment and the sense of morality and the 
common sense of the people ? 

A . Precisely as in anything else. In the prevention of burglary, I would 
say that that would depend very much upon the moral sense of the people ; 
but I would not say from that, that we must not have a stringent law to 
prohibit it. 

Q. The analogy would apply if I had proposed to you to apply the laws 
against drunkenness. Now, please consider the very question I put to you : 
whether, considering the fact of a vast volume of spirituous liquor, in one 
form or another, spread out over the country and in the hands of the people, 
you are not at last, in spite of all your prohibitory laws, obliged to depend 
upon morality as the restraint of the people ? 

A . I said that the prohibitory law would help us in giving strength to the 
people. They lose their courage, unless we have the help of law as we do in 
other crimes. 

Q. You have not answered my question, or even tried ? 

A. I thought I was trying pretty hard. Do you mean that I must answer 
yes or no ? 

Q. It is capable of an answer, yes or no. 

A . Will you be, good enough to repeat your question. 

Q. I ask you whether, considering the fact that there is a very large quan- 
tity of spirituous liquor, in one form or another, spread out over the commu- 
nity and in the hands of such a large portion of the people daily, you are not 
in truth compelled to rely upon the self-restraint and morality of the people 
rather than upon any law ? 

A. I say no, not without a law. 

Q. You say no, not without a law ? 

A. I say I would not depend upon the moral effect in a community with- 
out a law to support them. 

Q. In point of fact, are you not by the very necessity of the case com- 
pelled to depend upon that, because do not people have it within their reach ? 
And does not the fact of their known abuse depend upon their self-restraint, 
and not upon the existence of a law which does not apply ? 

A. I should say no, because the multitude of criminals who come into 
court get but very little idea of the law, except by the punishment. If the 
law is low, they get very little idea of their crime ; so if the people find out 
that the State have made this a grave offence, it will strengthen the moral 
sense of the people. 

Q. Then you desire to have this forcible legislation kept up, for the pur- 
pose of bearing a sort of testimony to the people ? 

A. Not chiefly. We have no right to license an evil, or in any way to 
legislate an evil, whether we can prohibit it or not. 

Q. Who has asked you to license an evil ? 



APPENDIX. 585 

A. Those who ask for a license law. Those who would be sure to sell if 
an opportunity was allowed. You and those who are with you want to permit 
the sale to a certain extent ; we feel that it is ruinous, and we do not want it 
done. 

Q. Have we not said that we wanted a law to prevent men from getting 
drunk ? Have we not stated that it should not be sold, except under strict 
regulations ? 

A . I understand those who are back of you ask for a law that will permit 
the sale with certain restrictions. 

Q. Have you seen anything of that sort in the petition ? 

A. Not, perhaps, in the exact language. 

Q. Does not the petition in fact ask the law to let alone the whole subject, 
but to allow the sale of spirituous and fermented liquors under the restrictions 
necessary for the good order and decorum of society, leaving it to individual 
self-restraint as regards its use, but to punish him in this use if he is guilty 
of a misdemeanor ? 

A. It may be so. 

Q. Have you any objection to that ? 

A. Certainly I have ; that is the whole thing. 

Q. Then you do object to the citizen's being allowed to regulate his own 
conduct in respect to its use ? 

A. No, I do not. 

Q. Being responsible to the law for the guilt of it ? 

A. I do not object to the citizen's regulating his own eating and drinking, 
until it comes in conflict with the rights and privileges of his neighbors. 

Q. And thus responsible, you do admit that he may regulate his own 
conduct, do you not ? 

A. I object to the licensing of men who will open tempting bars, bril- 
liantly lighted, with great attractions, in the city and in the country, to tempt 
my son, or my friend, who are young and inexperienced, and to make it such 
a power and influence upon them, that they will probably be humiliated and 
ruined. 

Q> Suppose we strike out these tempting bars, then what ? 

A. Well, it would be better. 

Q. Nobody has yet proposed these ; so you can leave these out. 

A. My statement is based on a license system, so far as I have been able 
to learn of it. They have always been connected with temptation. If you 
will present something that will accomplish the result desired as completely as 
the prohibitory law, I will examine it. 

Q. Are you in favor of the present state of things, which forbids an 
apothecary to sell, excepting by the prescription of a physician ? 

A. Do you mean by the direction of a physician ? 

Q. You know what the present law is in reference to apothecaries ? 

A. I have read it, I believe. 

Q. Are you satisfied with it as it stands ? 

A. I have no objection to it. 

Q. Are you aware that there is not, and never has been, and never can 
be an apothecary pursuing his business in Massachusetts as an apothecary is 
74 



586 APPENDIX. 

obliged to pursue it, without constant and almost hourly violation of this 
law ? 

A. I am not aware of any such thing. 

Q. You are not aware that this is so ? 

A. I did not know that apothecaries could not keep this law. 

Q. If it should turn out that they could not, would you wish to change it ? 

A. The question would be, — what are proper duties ? I think an apothe- 
cary ought never to give very dangerous medicines without the direction of a 
physician. I should be very slow, indeed, to consider this a criminal sale 
where it is put up in a prescription by an apothecary or his clerk. 

Q. Have you examined the business of apothecaries sufficiently to notice 
that from ten to twenty-five per cent, of the business of apothecaries is 
necessarily unlawful ? 

A. I do not think it is, necessarily. 

Q. Then you have not examined the case ? You are reasoning a prior 1 
upon it ? 

A. I have several friends who are acquainted with it. 

Q. Did you ever talk with apothecaries concerning it ? 

A. I do not know as I have. 

Q. Do you know that there is not an apothecary in the city that is not lia- 
ble to go to the penitentiary for a longer period than any of us will live ? 
Are you satisfied with that as it stands ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Do you not know that from ten to twenty-five per cent, of the bus- 
iness necessarily done by apothecaries is done in violation of this prohibitory 
law? 

A. I do not know any such thing ; I do not believe it. 

Q. Do you understand that the people of Massachusetts, who support the 
present prohibitory law, patronize, for necessary and useful purchases, the 
State Agency alone, in procurement of their liquors and wines ? 

A. I suppose they do. 

Q. Is that your experience ? 

A. It is. 

Q. That they purchase what they use of town agents ? 

A. I suppose so. There may have been a time when this question was 
supposed to be given up — two or three years ago, perhaps, during the war, 
when there was carelessness about it. But there is no doubt in my own 
mind that now, when there is a disposition to carry out the law and enforce 
it, the temperance men will abide by the law strictly. 

Q. Have they done so ? 

A . I have not examined. 

Q. So far as you know ? 

A. I do not know of an instance. 

Q. Have you heard of any ? 

A. I have not heard of any. 

Q. And yet you edit a weekly paper, do you ? 

A. I do. 



APPENDIX. 587 

Testimony of Mayor George O. Fairbanks. 
Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are Mayor of Fall River ? 
A. I am. 

Q. You know the question at issue here ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Which are you in favor of, a license law or a prohibitory law ? 

A. I am in favor of the prohibitory law as it now stands. 

Q. How does it work in your region now ? 

A. It is all that can be desired ; and does a great deal for the cause of 
temperance, as I believe. 

Q. Have you been acquainted with the operation of the license law ? 

A. Nothing further than that we drove the rumsellers out of our town, 
and they ran into another State. 

Q. Does that do anything to restrain the amount of drinking ? 

A. It does not so far as I know. 

Q. Have you any particular statement to make, to show how the law 
operates in your city ? 

A. I have only been engaged in my present duties for a short time, and 
have not had time to gather up many statistics. I have made inquiries of 
those who have been in office before me, as to the state of things before as 
compared with the operation of the State Constabulary system, we having 
but a single member. 

Q. That single member has done something ? 

A. The testimony is that he has. In my own position I have seen some- 
thing of the effect of its workings ; and those who have seen it testify that 
there is something done. They testify that there are fewer places than for- 
merly, and that a certain portion are removed. I can recollect many which 
were among the most troublesome places that we had. 

Q. Is there anything you would like to say further in relation to it ? 

A. I do not know as there is anything particular. As I have said, the 
temperance cause is active at present, and has been during the last year. 

Q. There is a large moral movement ? 

A. Yes, sir. There are large organizations that hold their meetings 
weekly. There is one that holds its meetings Sunday evenings ; and there has 
been an attendance consisting of men mostly, at which there is an admission 
fee at the door, and at which there were thirteen hundred present at a recent 
meeting ; thus showing the degree of activity in the cause. 

Q. You do not see that this is diminished by the operation of the law ? 

A. No, sir; I do not. 

Q. Does not the operation of the law stimulate them ? 

A. It has been my opinion that it does. 

Testimony of Rev. Eli Thurston, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You know the questions which are usually put 
nere, I suppose. Which do you prefer, a license law or a prohibitory law ? 

A . Well, sir, I have long been a prohibitionist, and I have no confidence 
myself in the operations of a license law, and I have reason I think to believe 
in the total and entire success of this law of prohibition, if it is rigidly 



588 APPENDIX. 

enforced, and I wish to add my testimony to what the mayor just said. The 
people of Fall River are somewhat peculiarly situated ; almost the entire 
respectability, wealth, influence and property of that city are in favor, as they 
always have been, of the prohibitory law. The whole power of the city is on 
that side. You could not get any vote that would amount to anything, so far 
as character, wealth, influence and business is concerned, on the other side. 
In regard to the execution of the law, I may say that a single man came in 
to the city (I cannot say how long since, perhaps six months ago), and 
although the people generally did not seem disposed to co-operate with him, 
and although the city government were opposed to him, and also the police, he 
shut up almost all of those great rum-shops in that city, in the course of a few 
months ; and he did it almost alone, which is proof to me that there is power 
in that law. I have seen it executed by the people themselves two or three 
times when I have been there. A little excitement in the temperance cause 
and the people would take hold of the law. They shut these places all up 
without any difficulty at all. It has been done repeatedly, proving that they 
can do it any day. The question may be asked, why they do not undertake 
it, and why they do not keep these places closed. And my answer is, that the 
men who are opposed to the law and in favor of the license law, are of such a 
character that it is unsafe for a temperance man to move strongly in that mat- 
ter. Men have lost their barns, and they have had fire set to their houses, and 
they have been afraid to execute that law, as they would otherwise unques- 
tionably have done. In regard to a license law, I based it first on principle. 
It is based on a false principle. It licenses a certain class of men to sell an 
article which is a fruitful cause of crime, degradation and ruin. If you would 
have a license in which men should be restricted in the use of this article, and 
the least drunkards, men who are burdens to society, and who should be under 
heavy bonds not to sell to young men, or intemperate men, there would be 
some plausibility to the theory. The other course proposed by all license 
laws, is simply filling up the ranks of drunkards as fast as they die off, and 
making the place where liquor is drank and sold respectable, and taking 
young men and initiating them into this vice, and to keep the ranks of the 
intemperate full. If you could reverse the thing entirely there would h( 
some show of plausibility to the temperance law ; and I am persuaded thai 
people of my own city, and of my own region, the temperance men, thos 
who have acted in this cause, and have labored in it and have suffered for it 
are, as a community, opposed to the license law. Our ministers of almos 1 
all denominations are opposed to the license law ; and very seldom do I hear 
a minister express the least distrust of the righteousness and the necessity of 
the prohibitory law. 

Q. How is it with the Catholic clergy in your city ? 

A. I am not able to state as to that. There is but one there, and I believe 
he has not been here to testify. 

Q. Do the other clergymen, the Orthodox, the Baptist, the Methodist, the 
Universalist ministers in Fall River, favor the license law ? In your judg- 
ment, is there one of these who does ? 



APPENDIX. 589 

A. I am not certain about that. There is one clergyman who, I under- 
stood, refused to sign the petition against the license law. I do not know the 
fact. 

Q. It is said that people can go over into Ehode Island and get liquor 
there, if they desire to ? 

A. Yes, sir; and the clerk of the boat told me last night that when Major 
Blood was there, he carried load after load of decanters, pumps and all that 
kind of thing, which they use in their bar-rooms, to towns where there is a 
license law, and these men set up there without any license. In the town of 
Warren, where there were twenty or thirty sellers, there was only one 
licensed, as I understand. After Major Blood left Fall River (so the clerk 
told me), they brought them back to the boat one day before they received a 
telegram that the Major had got back, and there was a great scrambling to 
get their fixtures all back again. 

Q. Did they carry them back to Rhode Island ? 

A. They left them at the wharf. 

Q. Do you understand that they are trying to get rid of their license law 
in Rhode Island ? 

A. Well, sir, I have heard that they are trying- to strengthen it and give 
it some back-bone. 

Q. Is there anything further you would like to say ? 

A . I want to say one word in reference to the question which was put in 
reference to the Scripture argument of this matter of old wine and new wine, 
and whether or not the Scripture recognizes these articles as wine. We read 
in the Bible, " Your presses shall burst out with new wine ; " that, certainly, is 
not fermented wine. It establishes the fact in my own mind that that article 
which is called in the Scriptures, wine, is unfermented juice of the grape. 
One man was asked if the Bible said that if a man drunk a glass of wine, he 
should not inherit the kingdom of God. The Bible does say this : " Touch 
not, taste not, handle not ; " and it says, " Look not upon the wine when it is 
red, when it giveth its glory in the cup." And that is more stringent than any 
prohibitory law that I ever heard of, or the creed of any temperance man 
that I ever heard of. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How do you suppose it possible that the wine- 
press could burst out with anything else but new wine ? 

A. I do not suppose it could. The question is whether the Scripture 
recognizes the application of the term wine to that which is unfermented. 

Q. The question was how could it be anything but new wine when it is 
bursting out of the press ? 

A. Of course it could not. 

Q. But is it not clear from your text, or from your quotation, that when 
the text means new wine, it says so ? 

A. I do not think it is necessary to suppose that it always implies it. It 
simply shows this point, and that is all I adduced it to show : that the term 
wine is applied to the juice of the grape, before it is fermented. 

Q. Do you not recollect that it says in the New Testament, No mai 
putteth new wine into old bottles, lest the bottles burst ? 
. A. Yes, sir. 



590 APPENDIX. 

Q. And there is another illustration where the Scripture, when it means 
new wine, says so. Now how is new wine going to burst a bottle (which 
among the ancients was usually a leather bag), unless on account of the 
process of fermentation which changes it into wine proper, or old wine ? 

A. I do not care to be drawn from the simple point for which I quoted 
that passage. 

Q. When our Saviour made wine at the marriage feast, was not the wine 
that he made praised by the people who drank it, because it was the best wine 
which they had at the feast ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Can you conceive it possible that if they had been drinking old or 
fermented wine before, they should have called that better wine ? 

A. There may have been temperance people there. 

Q. If they had been pursuing your theory, they would not have drank the 
other at all, would they ? 

A. Perhaps they did not ; there is no proof that they drank any other. 

Q. Do you not know that from the beginning until now, the Jewish peo- 
ple, celebrating the Feast 6f the Passover, have always celebrated it with fer- 
mented wine ? 

A . I do not know that. 

Q. Do you not know that Rev. Mr. Smith, one of the Protestant missionaries 
in Palestine some years ago, writing an article which was published in the 
" Bibliotheca Sacra," said that at the present day it is in use, and that no other 
wine would be admissible in the Hebrew Feast of the Passover, and that such 
is the tradition ? 

A. That was a good many years ago. This is a recent thing that he states 
this fact in regard to. 

Q. This is a recent thing which he states now, but does he not state that 
the fact is such as far as the Hebrew tradition extends ; is not that a fact ? 

A. I believe it to be a fact. 

Q. Do you not understand that so far as the traditions of the Christian 
churches go back into the remote ages, whether you assume the Apostolic 
succession with the Catholic and Episcopal Churches, or whether you 
assume the belief of other denominations upon this point, the unbroken 
practice and custom of the church has been in observing the sacrament of 
the Lord's Supper, which was a continuation of the Feast of the Passover, 
to use fermented wine ? 

A. I have not any disposition to doubt that point at all. There are ques- 
tions in reference to that subject, as they are presented to us in the Bible, 
that I acknowledge that I cannot explain to my own satisfaction ; but I would 
say here that the people with whom I am acquainted, are unwilling to stake a 
great principle that involves the welfare of the people, upon any of these 
things. They look upon that subject just as they looked upon certain objec- 
tions made formerly upon the subject of slavery, precisely of the same char- 
acter and disposed of in the same way. 

Q. Is not, perhaps, the great peculiarity of the Hebrew system of religion, 
and of the Mosaic system, its system of prohibition ? Is not one great pecu- 
liarity of the Mosaic system its prohibitory character, and the constant recur- 



APPENDIX. 591 

rence of the " thou shalt not," covering both meat and drink in the practice 
of life ? 

A- There were a great many prohibitions of that kind. 

Q. A vast number, were there not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did not Mohammed, some six hundred years after Christ, institute a 
prohibition against the use of wine, which was not found among the Christian 
nations ? 

A . I am not aware of that fact. 

Q. Are you not aware that Mohammed prohibited wine ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you aware that there was any prohibition of that kind among the 
Christian nations before that, or that it was understood by Christian nations, 
or any portion of them down to that time, as forming any part of their 
system ? 

A. There was af class of men prohibited expressly from using wine ? 

Q. What class ? 

A. The sons of Levi. 

Q. Did these sons of Levi form any portion of the Christian Church ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. I ask, whether you do not recollect that Mohammed introduced the 
prohibition of wine six hundred years after Christ, when during the inter- 
vening six hundred years down to that time, among the Christian churches no 
such prohibition existed ? 

A. I am not certain about that fact ; it may be so. 

Q. Do you not recollect that after the ascension of Christ, the whole sys- 
tem of prohibition, touching clean and unclean things, was put to an end, and 
determined, and understood by the Apostles to be determined ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that he in his turn instructed them that they must put all that 
system of prohibition behind them ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I admit all that. 

Q. And that the Apostles did themselves partake of wine ? 

A. It always does the temperance cause good when you get down to these 
quibbles. 

Q. Let us understand each other, and I will leave the people to understand 
for themselves. 

A. I do not deny anything you state, sir. 

Q. Do you desire that the State shall put a law upon us in this matter, 
which the Christian system did not require ? 

A. Which the Christian system did not in its earlier days. 

Q. Do you recollect, too, that there was a substitution by the Apostles in 
the place of these ancient prohibitions of a new rule by which the Christian 
should be enabled to judge himself, and all Christian people were to be 
entitled to judge of themselves, and their own conduct ? 

A. If they did not infringe upon the rights of others. 

Q. But did not the Apostle say concerning the use of meats and wines, 
" Let no man judge you ? " 



592 APPENDIX. 

Mr. Spooner. That was in reference to the ceremonial service. 

A. Yes, sir; and the Governor knows it was. 

Q. Is there any other rule for the Christian world, touching this whole 
subject, than this rule laid down by the Apostle to " stand fast in the liberty 
with which you have been made free ; " and again, " in whatsoever you eat or 
whatsoever you drink, do it all for the glory of God ? " 

A. That is very good doctrine. 

Q. That is the Christian liberty, is it not ? Was it ever intefered with in 
Christian nations until the Mohammedan religion ? 

A. We are perfectly willing men should have that liberty until they come 
to encroach upon the liberties of society. 

Q. There is no dispute as to that. Do you know the effect of the Moham- 
medan system of prohibition upon its own followers ? 

A. I have not taken pains to consider that matter. 

Q. Are you not aware that the Mohammedan religion was the most effi- 
cient system possible, because the law of the Koran was not only binding as a 
matter of religion, but was also binding upon the citizen ? 

A. I do not believe any such law is upon our statute books at the present 
day. The present law binds nobody's conscience. 

Q. Exactly. On the other hand it is weaker than the Mohammedan sys- 
tem of prohibition, for that was binding upon the conscience as well as the 
duties of the citizen. If you have not pursued the investigation, I will not 
press the question, but if you have, I would like to know what is the fact ? 

A. If I were to admit that, I should not admit that the simple act of pro- 
hibition had been the great instrumentality that had wrought the evil, by any 
means. 

Q. I ask you, if in view of the fact that, whereas Mohammed published his 
religion very nearly, in point of place, where the religion of Christ was first 
promulgated, he did fulminate his decree against the use of wine, whereas 
Christ never did, is there not some inference to be drawn from that fact, I 
would ask you ? 

A. Are all laws to be stricken off from the statute book because they pro- 
hibit crimes ? Why should you single out this law any more than the law 
that prohibits stealing, or the law that prohibits murder ? 

Q. Simply because you have undertaken, by artificial legislation, to make 
an artificial offence. Now I ask you whether or not there is any inference to 
be drawn from the fact that Mohammed fulminated his decree against the use 
of wine, and Christ did not ? 

A. The Governor may draw such an inference, and he may be perfectly 
honest in it ; but it will be very difficult, in my own opinion, for him to make 
the community make any such inference. I cannot conceive how you single 
out this prohibitory law, in relation to intoxicating driuks, and leave un- 
touched all other prohibitory laws. That is the point that I do not understand. 
I put this on the same ground that I do other prohibitory laws ; and, in my 
mind, it is as necessary to prohibit the sale of intoxicating drinks, as it is 
to prohibit robbery and arson. We oftentimes prohibit a man from injuring 
his neighbor, when we have no right to prevent his injuring himself. That is ; 
that we have no legal right. A man may use anything injurious to himself 



APPENDIX. 593 

and family, and we cannot prohibit him from doing that. He must do it and 
take the consequences, and his family must take the consequences. 

Q. Now, then, since the Christian system was a republication of the 
moral law of Moses, and since the moral law* declares " thou shalt not 
kill," and since, under the Christian system, there was no prohibition against 
wine, with what propriety do you put me that question and make me that 
J-eply, or undertake to draw any analogy between the drinking and selling of 
wine and the unlawful and murderous taking of life ? 

A. I think it is a taking of life. I think it is murder. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) The Levitical priesthood were prohibited the 
use of wine, were they not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. We have had many clergymen here and doctors of divinity, who have 
testified in favor of a license law. Do you not think it would be beneficial if 
they were subject to such a law, they and their people ? 

A. I do, sir, I have a high respect for these men, but it does seem to me 
that some of them have not got into the nineteenth century, 

Adjourned. 

75 



594 APPENDIX. 



SEVENTEENTH DAY. 

Wednesday, March 20, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony in 
behalf of the Remonstrants was continued. 

Testimony of Ex-Mayor Zebinah L. Raymond. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You reside in Cambridge, do you not ? 

A, Yes, sir. 

Q. And have been connected with the city government there ? 

A. I was mayor in 1855 and 1864. 

Q. How is the state of things in Cambridge now, with regard to the use 
and sale of liquor, compared with what it was when you were first mayor ? 

A. I think there is a decided improvement in Cambridge in regard to 
drunkenness in the place. There are not so many drunkards there now.as 
there was in 1855. 

Q. Do you think the number of places of sale was greater then in propor- 
tion to the number of places of sale now ? 

Q. I have no doubt of it. I do not know but one place of sale where it is 
common to go in and purchase liquor, and where it is an open place. There 
are others, I believe. 

Q. You can look back to the time when we used to have licenses in various 
places in the State ? 

A. Yes, sir; I think I understand the system of licenses pretty well. 
When I first commenced business in Boston, I was in the West India grocery 
trade. It was common for most merchants to sell liquors as they did other 
goods. At the commencement of 1840, I turned out all the liquor that I had 
in the store, because I deemed it to be wrong to sell. Previous to that time 
we used to sell largely to country traders. In several stores I recollect, in 
Worcester and in Franklin Counties, they sold a hogshead a week. 

Q. What town was that ? 

A. In the town of Petersham, in Worcester County. 

Q. What is the population of that town ? 

A. At that time it was four thousand, or in that neighborhood. That was 
thirty years ago. That was in the summer season. I speak of that to show 
that the diminution in the sale of liquor is very large, whereas it may not be 
so in Boston. 

Q. Do you believe that in the country towns like that, there is a fifteenth 
part now used, per head, that there was then ? 

A. I do not think there was a twentieth part used then that there is now 
in the very large majority of the towns of the Commonwealth. 

Q. Is there a fifteenth part now used, compared with what there was used 
before the reform commenced ? 



APPENDIX. 595 

A. I do not think there is in the country, sir. I am not qualified to judge 
exactly about it; but that is my opinion, so far as my observation extends. 

A. You are quite sure that the number of places is reduced in Cam- 
bridge ? 

A. Yes, sir. I believe that the present prohibitory law is productive of a 
great deal more of good than any license law that can possibly be made, for 
the reason that the license system cannot be based on any principle of equal 
justice. The principle of the present law is a just one ; all are restricted from 
the sale. The moment you establish a license system, you have the rich 
pitted against the poor. I think it is impossible to make a license law that 
shall be so satisfactory and just in all respects as the present law. I think 
that we ought to try and enforce this law, now that we have more leisure than 
we have had for some years. 

Q. Is it not enforced in the country now ? 

A. Well, sir, I think it is, to a very great extent. I think there is no dif- 
ficulty in the enforcement of the law in all places except in Boston ; and I 
think if influential men would give their influence to the enforcement of the 
law, it would be enforced. 

Q. Do you not think that the plan proposed here, which is to let every 
municipality license or not, as they please, would be very unjust and unequal 
in its operation ? For instance, here is a certain town votes not to sell and 
not to license, and an adjoining town (perhaps villages within a mile or two 
of each other), licenses the sale, and attracts young men, and those who have 
the habit strong, over into this town. Do you not think that this, in effect, 
nullifies the operation of the law, and that this would be the necessary opera- 
tion of it '? 

A. I think it is. I think that if Cambridge refused to license, and Brigh- 
ton and Somerville should license, the law would be of very little value to us ; 
and a very large share of the liquor drank now in Cambridge, is brought from 
Boston by expressmen. And I think that it would be one of the worst laws 
that could be enacted. It would be of no kind of benefit to the town that 
tried to prohibit it. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You spoke of the state of things about the time of 
the reformation. How long did the great change that you refer to occur 
before 1852 ? 

A. I think it did, to some extent, before to 1852, through moral suasion; 
and I think that the great thing that has drove out intemperance since then 
has been the law. 

Q. Did not all the change occur prior to 1852 ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. 

Q. Do you mean to say that, previous to 1852, there were public sales in 
these towns ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. You do not know the fact, do you ? 

A. I know it as much as anything that I have not seen with my own eyes. 
I do not know that it is sold in a particular town. I would not swear that it- 
was sold in that town. 

Q. Do you know anything about the State Agency in that town ? 



596 APPENDIX. 

A. No, sir; nothing at all. 

Q. I want to ask you whether you are wedded to any particular form of 
law, or if you simply desire a law that would, in connection with other instru- 
mentalities, diminish drunkenness and promote temperance ? Is that the 
kind of law you would prefer ? 

A. It is, sir. 

Q. If any modification of the present law would make it more beneficial, 
you would not object to it ? 

A. I would be in favor of the law that would be of the most good to all 
the people in the Commonwealth. 

Q. If it could be accomplished without any legislation, should you think it 
would be worth the while to have legislation upon it ? 

A. I should not. I do not believe that, in my own experience in Massa- 
chusetts, it can be done without the law and among all men. I think that 
when a man becomes satisfied of an evil, he will do better to restrain himself 
from it without the action of law, if he can. 

Q. What you want is something to check intemperance and drunkenness, 
is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Then it becomes a question of fact, which kind of law will best pro- 
mote that result ? 

A. Yes, sir, that is the object. 

Q. Is that a question upon which honest minds may well differ ? 

A. I think honest minds may differ, but I think some persons are better 
qualified to judge than others. 

Q. There are men that are not as well qualified to judge as others. You 
do not claim that you are a better judge than anybody, do you ? 

A. I do not. I think anybody should form his opinion upon the informa- 
tion which he has. 

Q. Do you mean to say that people do not get liquor in Cambridge ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not attempt to say so. 

Q. Do you know whether your grocers, though they do not keep it in 
sight, yet have liquors which they supply to families ? 

A. I do not know of a grocer that sells it. 

Q. Do you know of any that do not ? 

A . I know of many that I think do not. 

Q. Are there any cases of intemperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How do they compare with several years ago ? 

A. I believe there has been a great improvement during the last ten years. 

Q. Was there more twenty years ago than now ? 

A. I have not any doubt of it in my own mind. 

Q. What are your means of observation ? 

A. Simply meeting with other persons, and conversation, etc. 

Q. Did you ever compare the reports of arrests in the courts, with the 
view of comparing the amount of intemperance at different times ? 

A. The only comparison that I have made is between 1863 and 1866, in 
looking over financial reports that I had. 



APPENDIX. 597 

Q. How was it in 1865 ? 

A. I did not compare the amount in 18G5. There was a gain of thirty- 
one in the arrests for drunkenness, as between the years 1863 and 1866. 
There were less in 1866, notwithstanding the increase in population. 
Q. How was it in 1860 ? Do you know the number of arrests ? 
A. I do not, sir. 

Q. You said that you regarded one obstacle in the way of the operation 
of the present law, as resting upon the fact that a great many influential men 
in the community were not favorable to it. If they came in with one voice 
in support of the present system you think it would be carried out do you ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Suppose they will not, what are you going to do ? 

A. I look ( upon it in this way : I think it has been a moral question very 
much like the question of slavery ; not exactly so, but to some extent. I 
believe that if we had not at the North taken a decided position we never 
could have accomplished the results that have been accomplished. I believe 
that if we make up our minds as decidedly in regard to the question of tem- 
perance, as we did in the war, we can do a great deal. I think it would be 
exceedingly injudicious to repeal the law at the present time, until we have 
an opportunity after our war to see if we can test it. 

Q. You say that a class of people do not favor the prohibitory laws. If 
they do not, what are you going to do about it ? 

A. I should do the best thing that I could, as I said before. I think that 
the present law is the best law. 

Q. What remedy do you propose ? 

A. We must do with this as with all obstinate cases. I believe, sir, that 
we effect a good many moral reforms where we have but a bare majority to 
start with, that majority being determined ; whereas, if we had to get a very 
large majority before we started, it would come much later. 

Q. Do you think you can get a large majority in favor of this law, when 
there is this large class of people who are accustomed to drink wines ? 

A. We shall get along until they are satisfied with the change. 

Q. Do you believe that the law will make them change their view ? 

A. I believe it does sometimes make people change their minds. 

Q. Their co-operation seems needful to make your law work well ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you believe the law has any tendency to make these people change 
their views ? 

A. Yes, sir; I believe it has; because public sentiment has changed a 
good deal. 

Q. Do you think, as a matter of fact, that the law ever reforms a criminal ? 

A. Yes, sir; I think so. I think it has a tendency to make them better 
men. 

Q. Do you think that a thorough reformation of a criminal was ever 
effected by any law in the world ; and by reformation, I mean an entire 
change of the aims and purposes of life and action ? 

A. I presume there have been cases. I could not point to a case just now. 

Q. Did you ever know of one ? 



598 APPENDIX. 

A . Yes, sir ; I have known of one. 

Q. The law did it ? 

A. I know the person was a better man when the law had hold of him. 

Q. When you appeal to fear, is that a motive which changes the purposes 
of a person's heart ? 

A . No, sir ; I appeal to the higher passions. 

Q. Do you mean to say that the infliction of a penalty (I do not mean to 
say that they should not have these laws against drunkenness), does of itself 
ever reform the drunkard ? 

A. I believe, sir, that there have been cases; and I could mention one 
case where a man who had led a dissolute life was confined for a time, and 
after having time to deliberate, and by the advice of others, had been 
reformed. 

Q. Not by the law alone, but by these moral influences ? 

A. The law was the foundation of it, sir. 

Q. Is it true that the convicts in State Prison, as a general rule, come out 
moral men ? Is there not something in the very effect of the execution of the 
criminal law, that tends to prevent those moral changes necessary to precede 
real reformation ? 

A. I do not know, sir, that there is anything in it that would prevent it. 
I think that they are intended, when the Legislature makes them, to produce 
good, and by being enforced, to effect a reform which nothing else could 
effect. 

Q. You do not suppose that the law tends much to make a man religious ? 

A. No, sir; but I think that the law, by restraining a man who is an 
exceedingly immoral man, and giving him an opportunity to reflect, may 
sometimes reform him. 

Q. Do you think that this law, since 1852 has, in the city of Boston, 
diminished drunkenness or promoted temperance ? 

A. I am not so well qualified to judge in regard to Boston ; but if you 
would compare Boston at the present time with the condition of things at that 
time, my impression is that you would find that there had been a decided 
improvement. 

Q. I would like to inquire whether, in the making of laws, there ought 
not to be, in your judgment, some reference to the public sentiment and the 
state of things ? 

A . Yes, sir. I think there ought to be. 

Q. Now, are there not portions of the Commonwealth who have opinions 
very different in regard to this matter ; and that the same law which would 
operate well in Berkshire, might not operate well in Boston ? 

A. I think that the duty of the Legislature is to make such laws, as should 
be productive of the greatest good to the greatest number of people in the 
Commonwealth. 

Q. Still we find that in the rural counties of the State, intemperance is 
very much checked and the evil is not very great ; but yet, that in Boston and 
the larger cities of the Commonwealth, it is different. Now, I ask you, do 
you think that the same means that would operate well in Berkshire, would, 
of course, cause them to operate well in the larger cities ? 



APPENDIX. 599 

A. I think the same force could not annihilate it in Boston as elsewhere; 
but if you annihilate it in Suffolk County and then bend your forces to 
annihilating it in other places, you would accomplish the desired object more 
speedily. 

Q. But here is a large quantity of the article which goes cut among the 
manufacturers and among the people, some fifty millions of gallons. How 
are you going to prevent the people from getting this which has been sold ? 

A. There is no general rule but what there is some exception to it, and it 
may be difficult, perhaps, in all cases to exclude the article. 

Q. Is there not a very great difficulty, taking the fact that this large quan- 
tity is sold in every large shop and every manufactory — a very large amount, 
and more than half of the amount which is produced annually ; and takiog 
the fact that this is in the hands of the community — in preventing that liquor 
from getting into use among the people and producing the natural results ? 

A. I have no doubt, sir, that it is possible that it may be done. The 
mechanic may buy liquor for mechanical purposes and place it in his shop, 
and some individual may get it and take some of it, and drink it. And in that 
very case it would be very difficult to get a law to prevent him from using it ; 
but when you compare that with the power of the open shop, where your son 
and my son may go and get a drink every time he goes by it, I think that 
you will find there is a very great difference. 

Q. What would be your opinion if such a law as that which is proposed 
here could be carried into effect ? 

A. If I understand you, you desire that such houses as the Parker House 
and Tremont House shall be permitted to sell liquor to their guests. My 
opinion would be, that it would be very difficult to decide who those guests 
were. I live in Cambridge. I have a son nineteen years of age. His business 
is in Boston, for instance, and is invited to Parker's to dine or to sup with a 
party of friends. There would be a question as to whether he was a guest of 
the house as much as a traveller who is stopping there would be. If my son 
is a guest of the house, and the law allows these houses to sell liquor to their 
guests in that way, I think that a license system, in that respect, would be 
worse than the law as it exists at present. I look upon that as the very worst 
species of the thing. The influence of yourself and of Governor Andrew is 
very great, and that influence ought to be for the good of the community ; 
and if we attempt to make a law of this kind, I think we should consider the 
danger of making the sale, of liquor respectable in any place. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) The students of Cambridge College would be 
guests, would they not ? 

A. They would be guests ; I do not know how you could discriminate. 

Q. Some discussion has arisen in regard to the opinions of influential men, 
as being opposed to the enforcement of the law. Is it not a fact, that all 
reforms have arisen among a different class of people, and have been carried 
right over such men ? 

A . I do not know as they are carried over such men ; but reforms have 
generally been carried over the heads of some men very high in the commu- 
nity : and I believe that at first the class of men who were in favor of the 
prohibition of slavery was very small ; but I believe that they are now very 



600 APPENDIX. 

well satisfied with the result which has been accomplished. I believe that 
reforms are carried on the principle of eternal justice, no matter who is 
against them. 

Q. Do you think that the liquor-dealers of Boston are men to be classed 
particularly among the thinking men of the community ? 

A. I think that reasonable men endeavor to be reasonable in their 
opinions, though I suppose they may make mistakes. 

Testimony of William E. Jackson. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Your residence and business ? 

A. I reside in Boston ; my business is at 350 Hanover Street. 

'Q. Please to state your observation with reference to the workings of a 
license law and a prohibitory law. 

A. I suppose that the prime object which calls me here is my being con- 
nected with the Howard Benevolent Society and the Boston Provident Asso- 
ciation. I have been connected with these societies for the last few years ; 
some seven years with one, and four with the other. In these societies we are 
brought from house to house, and very directly into acquaintance with the 
effect of liquor ; and we see the effect of liquor and of drinking, in connec- 
tion with poverty. There have been a great many instances, of course, which 
have come under my observation ; but it would be monotonous here to state 
them. 

Q. Please to state them generally. 

A. I have a memorandum here of instances of marked interest as regards 
the effect of liquor, and also as regards the way in which liquor is obtained, 
as it is in a variety of ways, in this state of utter destitution. 

Q. Please to state a few of them, if you please ? 

A. Here is one case of a woman who is a communicant of the Episcopal 
Church. Her husband is a sea-faring man ; he is industrious and sober, 
generally ; but at times not. I would remark here that when we visit persons 
who make applications to us for aid, we do not take pains to let them know 
that we are going to visit them ; but endeavor to ascertain what is their real 
condition, and we walk in where they are without giving them much opportu- 
nity to be prepared. In this case which I refer to, I opened the door suddenly, 
and found the woman lying upon the bed, in an almost nude state, and she 
had a little infant that was travelling around over her and trying to wake 
her from the stupor she was in from the effect of the liquor she had been 
drinking. These persons will sell anything they have in the house in order 
to get money to obtain liquor ; and there have been instances in which the 
bible has been sold in order to get money to get liquor with. Another case 
was that of a man who had paralysis in both legs, and was mostly dependent 
upon charity. I called on him very recently. Just prior to my visit, the 
clergyman was there, praying with this man. After the clergyman retired, I 
got close to him. He would not admit to the clergyman that he had been 
drinking. I found that he had been drinking, and that he had been drinking 
excessively, and I notified everybody not to let him have any more liquor. 
There was an application recently by a woman who desired aid ; and I went 
into her house, and came upon her suddenly ; and on opening the door, I 



APPENDIX. 601 

found her sitting on the window-stool, and in such a state that she actually 
fell over and fell down as I went in. 

Q. Are such cases frequent ? 

A. They are very frequent indeed. 

Q. You see them every day ? 

A. We see them every week, at least ; we do not visit every day. I am 
of opinion that there is less liquor drank under the present law than formerly 
These is one way in which they buy it, which is by the gill. They obtain it, 
and they obtain it very freely. They pawn even their dresses, or anything 
with which they can get any money : and these articles are left at the discre- 
tion of the pawn-broker. Of course it is generally in destitute circumstances. 
Very generally, on these articles which are pawned, the time runs out, a*nd 
of course they are not redeemed. I do not think it is true that liquor is sold 
in the tenement houses to any great extent. I have visited tenement houses 
very frequently, and I never have yet come across a place where liquor was 
sold in them. One reason is that where it is sold there is invariably fighting. 
The owners of the buildings do not have a great deal to do with it ; but it is 
for the interest of the men who have the under-letting -of these rooms not to 
have any fighting. I find that liquor is drank more among foreigners. In 
fact I should say, from general observation, that two-thirds of the quantity 
of liquor drank is among foreigners. This is, of course, an invidious com- 
parison. The English, Portuguese, and Germans rank first as regards temper- 
ance. The Irish are famous for fighting. The Portuguese are more tem- 
perate than any other class of foreigners. I think that one-half of the pov- 
erty which we find is directly or indirectly owing to drink. At the time that 
I commenced my business at the junction of Salem and Charter Streets, this 
business had been carried on in connection with the grocery business, and I 
was obliged, in buying out the store, to buy the liquor; and I disposed of it in 
various ways, the rum to the physicians, the brandy to the soldiers, etc. And 
I think I stand in very good relations to those who used to buy liquors there. 
I then moved to Hanover Place. This place was a notorious rum-drinking 
place. I have done business there some two years, and the business has very 
much increased, and on account of not selling liquor, I think. I am m favor 
of the prohibitory law ; and I think that if people could see it in the places 
where we see it, they would be convinced of the need of it. I think that the 
idea of leaving it to the towns, to say whether they would license the sale of 
liquor or not, would be bad, even if the principle were applied to States. 

Q. You pursue the grocery business ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Without liquors ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you not find that you succeed as well, and sell as much as you 
would with liquors ? 

A. I do not know about the business of others, but we succeed very well. 
When we took the business they had been doing a business of ten thousand 
dollars, and we did a business of twenty-two thousand dollars the first year. 
I do not believe in liquor in any form except prescribed by a physician. 
76 



602 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Are you frequently in these tenement houses, in 
your ministrations among the poor ? 

A. Yes, sir ; daily. 

Q. Is there intemperance in these houses ? 

A. More or less all the time ; that is, in general. I do not know so much 
about them of late as formerly. 

Q. There is intemperance in them ? 

A. There is. , 

Q. Whether the liquors are sold in the houses, or not, you do not know ? 

A . I do not know ; I never have been able to ascertain. 

Q. The statement is made here that the liquor is carried into the houses 
and divided up among the different tenants. Have you seen anything in 
your observation to lead you to think that that statement is incorrect ? 

A. I have not been able to find liquor in quantity, except in the case I 
mentioned. 

Q. You stated that at the present time the bars are closed, and said some- 
thing about their carrying it out in quarts and gallons. What do you mean 
to say ? 

Q. I mean if they restrict the sale by the glass, they can buy it by the 
gill or by the small quantity. 

Q. Are these the places that the State Constable has shut up so 
rapidly ? 

A. I could not say as to that. 

Q. You say that the bars are closed, but that they sell over the bar in 
bottles ? 

A. The majority of those with whom I have come in contact have quit 
entirely. There are a few who sell in this way. 

Q. That is in these places where the bar is closed ? 

A . That is what I have been telling you. 

Q. Have you any doubt that a secret, furtive sale is carried on largely ? 

A. I am of opinion that it is not. 

Q. Have you any means of forming a definite opinion whether it is or not ? 

A.. The general conversation of parties interested, at the north part of the 
city, is that it is getting to be dangerous business to do it. The majority of 
them are waiting for the issue at the present time. I know personally of one 
man who has been indicted, I believe, several times, and has paid several 
fines ; and I am of the opinion that he does not sell in any way. And yet it 
is but a short time since I heard him say that he was going to take his 
chances. 

Q. How long since ? 

A. It is about two or three months. He said he could keep a small stock 
ready to be seized by the constable, and keep his entire stock somewhere 
near by. 

Q. Is not that a pretty extensive business ? 

A. I do not think it it is now. 

Q. You give your opinion from their conversation ? 

A. General conversation. 

Q. Do you suppose that they tell you truly ? 



APPENDIX. 603 

A . Well, sir, I cannot pretend to say that I am a judge of character very 
extensively. 

Q. Have they not a strong interest to deceive ? 

A. Yes, sir; but I do not base nry opinion only upon conversation with 
liquor-dealers. I base my remarks upon observation. 

Q. From what you see of the public appearance, you do not think there is 
much sold in this way ? Have you any other means of information ? 

A. No, sir ; but I think it may be easily found out. 

Q. Is intoxication in Boston increasing or decreasing, in your opinion ? 

A. In the city at large, as the question is put, I am not able to form a 
correct opinion ; but, confining it to the North End, I should say that intox- 
ication was decreasing. 

Q. How do you arrive at that opinion ? From general observation ? 

A. And from personal contact with parties who formerly drank 
excessively. 

Q. Have you, in getting at that opinion, consulted the police records ? 

A. I have, sir, somewhat ; but they are not sectionalized, and so they 
would not be of any information for me in regard to any particular district. 

Q. You have no direct information in regard to the whole city ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. The question is, whether the number of cases of drunkenness are 
increasing ; not as to the appearances. If the actual number of cases of drunk- 
enness, and the daily number of arrests, according to the police reports, is 
shown to have been on the increase, your general observation would not be so 
good as the statistical observation of the police officers, would it ? 

A. Of course not. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Is it a fact that the number of cases could be 
very much increased by the understanding of the different stages of drunk- 
enness ? 

A. Yes, sir ; that is a point that I wished to state. 

Q. Considering that these statistics may be varied by the different stages 
of intoxication in which persons are arrested, would you regard a comparison 
of numbers as having any great value ? 

A. No, sir; I* think a person would not be able to form a very definite 
opinion from them. I would say this, in reference to the influence of law at 
the North End : I think that this law is so practical that it drives men to 
reform. I think it operates as in old times the law drove us to Christ. I 
never have been able to obtain the reformation of a man without primarily, or 
in some way, the effect of the law upon him. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Have you noticed the reports of the cases 
of drunkenness in the " Boston Journal " for the past few weeks ? 

A . I think the cases are only about half as large as they were. 

Testimony of Mayor Rufus S. Frost. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How long have you held the position of Mayor of 
Chelsea ? 
A. Since the first of January. 
Q. This is your first year ? 



604 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is the feeling of your city government in regard to the existing 
law? 

A. The members of the city government have sent in a petition against a 
license law, signed by seven of the Aldermen and thirteen of the Common 
Council. 

Q. Your government, then, is decidedly in favor of the present law ? 

A. It is. 

Q. Is that law being executed in Chelsea ? 

A . It has been for the last two or three months. 

Q. Will you state with what success ? 

A. A year since, the City Marshal informed me there were seventy-six 
places where liquor was sold over there. Now there is not one where it is 
sold openly. 

Q. You do not consider it an open question whether the prohibitory law 
can diminish the sale of liquors ? 

A. It has diminished it. I cannot say whether it has suppressed it or not. 

Q. Has this law been executed exclusively by the Constabulary force ? 

A. Not exclusively ; the Constable of our city calls in the aid of the City 
Police. 

Q. Do they acquiesce ? 

A . They do, entirely. 

Q. Does the city government sympathize with them ? 

A. They do. 

Q. Do you observe any disturbances in your city in connection with the 
sale of liquor ? 

A. There are very few disturbances. At my request, the City Marshal 
took a list of the number of cases taken before the court from January first, 
1866. The number of cases of drunken disturbances last year was fifty-one ; 
the number the present year was thirty-six. 

Q. Your feeling is that the present law in regard to intemperance should 
be heartily sustained ? 

A. That is our belief, sir. 

Q. How would you feel with regard to the proposed plan of giving discre- 
tion to the cities and towns ? For example, should you in Chelsea decide 
against a license law, how would you be affected, in your judgment, by a 
license law in Boston ? 

A. We should be very sorry to have it done. Many of the cases of 
drunkenness which come to us now are of those who come home from the city 
late at night, and have to be taken care of. 

Q. Where is your place of business ? 

A. In Franklin Street, in this city. 

Q. In the jobbing business ? 

A. In the commission business. 

Q. What is the difference of opinion, so far as you know, among the 
merchants in that neighborhood, on the subject of license or prohibition ? 

A . My impression would be that they would be about equally divided. 



APPENDIX. 605 

Q. How are the clergy of your city disposed in this matter ? Do you 
know of any Protestant clergymen who are opposed to prohibition ? 

A. I cannot think of one. I think they are all in favor of the present 
law ; but I cannot say it from actual knowledge. I know that the majority 
of them are. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) There is no open sale in Chelsea, is there ? 
I A. Ho open sale. 
* Q. Is liquor procured, in your opinion ? 

A. I suppose there may be some places where it is secretly sold. 
Q. Have you any doubt of it ? 

A . One place came to our notice on Saturday last ; but on being notified 
by the State Constabulary, the man promised not to sell again. 
Q. Have you a State Liquor Agency in Chelsea ? 
A. We have, sir. 

Q. Do the people generally, for medicinal and culinary purposes, get 
their liquor there ? 

A. I am not acquainted with that part of the business. 
Q. Do you think that, to any considerable extent, they go there to get it ? 
A. I am not able to say, because I have not been at the liquor agent's 
since the commencement of my term of office. 

Q. Do you know the fact that people do purchase liquor for these 
purposes ? 
A . I do not. 

Q. Whether they go there or get it elsewhere, you do not know ? 
A. I do not. 

Q. There are places in Chelsea, are there not, where people can go and 
get liquor for any culinary purpose, if they want it ? 

A. I am not sufficiently acquainted with the traffic to know, sir. 
Q. Did you ever hear of any grocery in the city where they could not get 
it if they wanted it ? 

A. I am not aware of any grocer in the city who sells. 
Q. You do not know whether they sell or not, do you ? 
A. There may be some persons who sell. 

Q. What do you mean by open sale at the places where they keep liquor 
in the city ? Would you not call it an open sale where a man goes into a 
grocery and buys a bottle of wine or any kind of ardent spirits ? 

A. That I should call an open sale ; but I do not know that there is any- 
thing of that kind in the city. 

Q. So far as your observation in Boston is concerned, do you consider that 
there is less intemperance than there was fifteen years ago ? 

A. Among the class of men that I deal with, I think there is less than 
there was fifteen years ago. 

Q. How is it as to the people generally ? 

A. I do not think I could give any intelligent opinion on that subject ? 
Q. Do you know in regard to the use of liquor on social occasions, whether 
it is more commonly used than then ? 

A. I have an impression that a certain class use it more than formerly, 
and that other classes use it less. 



606 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do these families who use it go the agency or elsewhere ? 

A. I am not informed. 

Q. Your opinion I would like as to whether the kind of legislation that 
recommends itself to your judgment would be that which would most effectu- 
ally suppress intemperance. You are not wedded to any particular theory or 
any particular law ? 

A. Only so far as I can see that it operates well. 

Q. The law that operates best and checks intemperance most, you would 
think the best ? 

A . Yes, sir, decidedly. 

Q. And the question whether the present law or some modification of it is 
the best, is a matter of opinion between different individuals, according as 
they consider that fact, is it not ? 

A. Certainly, sir. 

Q. May it not be that the same law, executed in the same way, which 
would operate well in the country, would not operate well in the large cities 
like Boston ? 

A. I think that the principle should be adhered to. If the principle is 
right in the country, it is in Boston. If the principle is right in Chelsea, it is 
in Boston. 

Q. Suppose the principle to be right, yet is there not a state of things in 
which the same right principle would not operate as well in one place as in 
another, and that not owing to the principle, but to the difference in circum- 
stances ? 

A. It might not operate as well, but the principle would be the same. 

Q. Would you hold to the principle in such a case always, or try some- 
thing else as a matter of expediency ? 

A. I hardly think it would be right to do evil, that good might come from 
it. 

Q. Do you consider it wrong to sell a glass of liquor ? 

A. I do. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Were you ever a young man in business in this 
city, and was your commercial education in this city ? 

A. Yes, sir, twenty-nine years since. 

Q. Among the clerks or book-keepers, employes in respectable commercial 
houses in this city, how is it in that class of young men now ? Do they drink 
less or more, or is the influence of the employers such as to check habits of 
drinking more than formerly ? How is that ? 

A . I do not know that I should be able to make a correct comparison. I 
can remember a good many who started with me who are now in drunkards' 
graves, and some who will be likely to follow them if they continue their 
present habits. 

Q. Is not this true in this city : that of two young men of equal capacity 
for business — one in the habit of drinking and the other a total abstainer — is 
there a merchant in this city who would not employ the one who was a total 
abstainer in preference to the other ? 

A. I think there is no question about it at all. 



APPENDIX. 607 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you think it is a sin to sell a glass of cider to be 
drank ? 

A. Under certain circumstances, I think it would be. For instance, a 
friend of mine has been in the habit of drinking, and he has been doing all 
he can to become a sober man. I think it would be wrong for any person, 
knowing his situation, to sell him a glass of intoxicating liquor of any kind. 

Q. Take yourself, or Mr. Miner, or me. Do you think it would be a sin 
to sell a glass of liquor to either of us ? 

A. I think where men have had as much experience as you it would be safe. 

Q. Do you mean that, in all cases whatever, the selling of a glass of liquor 
to be drank, is a sin ? 

A . There are certain circumstances, of course, where it may not be. 

Q. Well, I mean as a beverage, not where a man is freezing or dying. But, 
in all cases, do you think it would be a sin to sell a glass of liquor to be drank ? 

A. I think it would be wrong to sell a glass of brandy. 

Q. Do you think it would be equally a sin, in all cases, to sell a glass of cider ? 

A. Not equally a sin. 

Q. Well, is it a sin to drink it ? 

A> I think not, sir. 

Q. Then, under the same circumstances, is it a sin to sell it ? 

A. I think not, sir. 

Q. If it is not a sin for me to drink it, is it a sin for me to sell it ? 

A. I think not, on that particular point. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are in the domestic goods business ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Your goods go all over the country ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. They say that about one-half of the liquor which is manufactured in 
the country is used in the arts, so that there would be considerable influence 
upon the business habits of the people, would there not ? 

A. That would be my impression. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Do you think it would be wrong for citizens to 
sell their cider, or any other kind of intoxicating liquor, in violation of the law ? 

A. I do. 

Testimony op Hon. John S. Ladd. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Cambridge. 

Q. How long have you resided there ? 

A. Since 1839. 

Q. What office do you hold ? 

A. For the last thirteen years, judge of the Police Court, for the district 
of Cambridge. 

Q. What is the state of the temperance cause in Cambridge now, com- 
pared with what it was thirteen years ago ? 

A. Unquestionably very much improved. The value of my opinion, per- 
haps, would be better determined by reference to certain statistics drawn 
from the records of my court, which are, I think, quite decisive upon that 



608 APPENDIX. 

question. Perhaps an inference drawn from them would depend somewhat 
upon the fact whether the comparisons made would include similar conditions 
of the respective periods. I would state that the administration of the busi- 
ness of the court has been, I think, very uniform, both as to the activity of 
the police in making prosecutions, the conditions of arrest, and the general 
uniformity of the practice. I am not aware that during the last dozen years 
there has been any essential change. The views of the court, of course, have 
controlled somewhat the action of the police as to the propriety of entering 
complaints. I would state that in cases of drunkenness, against parties 
charged as common drunkards, almost invariably, if not always, the complaints 
are entered by the police, not, as in a case of assault and battery and larceny, 
by citizens generally, but always by the police. Taking the year 1855-6, the 
average number of complaints for drunkenness per year was 389 ; for 1865-6, 
the average number of cases was 334, being sixteen per cent, less, the popula- 
tion increasing forty-five per cent., from 20,473 to 29,404. It is well known 
to those who are familiar with the administration of criminal justice, that there 
is a certain class of offences that run very nearly parallel with those of 
intemperance. Cases of simple assault and battery usually accompany 
intemperance. The number of cases for assault and battery, for the year 
1855-6, was 147 ; for 1865-6, 151. As perhaps slightly varying from this 
statement, I should say that as to crimes, generally, there has been an increase 
in some measure proportionate to the increase of population. The whole 
number of prosecutions before the court would probably average, for the year 
1855-6, about 650. This refers to criminal prosecutions. For the last two 
years, I think these would average about 900. Taking the average for the 
last six months, the difference is still greater. The number of prosecutions 
for intemperance during the last six months is 79, which would be an average 
of 158 for the year. The present population of Cambridge is about 32,000. 
It has increased fully fifty per cent, within the last twelve months. My 
impression and general observation confirm the inference to be drawn from 
these statements. Unquestionably there is much less intemperance externally 
than there was ten or twelve years ago. 

Q. How about the number of places of sale as compared with the number 
ten years ago ? 

A. There has been unusual activity by the police and especially by the 
State Constabulary within the last six months. I should think the fiVst seizure 
was about the first of July last. The first warrant issued from the police 
court was about the first of August. Since that time there have been about 
thirty warrants issued against parties violating the law, for the purpose of 
seizure. Within the past six months I think there has been a very great 
change. 

Q. And a reduction in the number of places ? 

A. Yes, sir. I think there has been. 

Q. Can you give the figures as to the number of places of sale now open ? 

A. I am not informed in regard to the number of places. I know that 
quite a large number have been closed. Parties have come forward who were 
prosecuted, in several instances, plead guilty and submitted to the fine ; and 
from information mainly derived from prosecuting officers, I have reason to 



APPENDIX. 609 

believe that many places have been closed. Those that are still open are 
engaged in secret sales. 

Q. Do you not think that it would be perfectly practicable in the State 
police to clear out the places of sale in Cambridge entirely ? 

A. There could be no question about that. 

Q. How would it work if there if there was a law which allows Boston to 
sell, and the sale in Cambridge was prohibited ? 

A. If the purpose of the law was to suppress intemperance it certainly 
would defeat the object in Cambridge, for the facilities of obtaining liquor are 
so great that it would be freely taken from Boston there. 

Q. Do you not understand that it is a great source of trouble with Cam- 
bridge College, that the young men are exposed to the temptations of the 
drinkinaj-houses of Boston ? 

A. That has never been prominently brought before me. 

Q. But do you not understand that they have been subject to temptation 
in that way, much to the regret of the government and the people there ? 

A . I cannot speak from any facts or information in my knowledge, but I 
suppose that if bar-rooms are open in Boston they are subject to that 
temptation. I can say this, that with some knowledge of the relations of 
students to the community, those of Cambridge College are as orderly, 
regular and temperate as the students of any college in the country. Very 
rarely is it known of students becoming intoxicated, and especially among 
the under graduates. The cases that have occurred have not been among the 
under graduates. 

Q. Do you not think that the sentiment of the people would be decidedly 
opposed to a license law in Cambridge ? 

A. If that is the opinion of a majority of the people of Cambridge, I have 
no opportunity, mode or means of determining it more than any other 
citizen, except from my incidental connection. I think it is very generally 
desired from all parties, by all classes that the open bars of the rum-sellers 
shall be closed. I think there is a very large majority who would unite in 
the means that would accomplish that object. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I suppose that there are a portion of the citizens of 
Cambridge, whether a majority or not I do not know, but a respectable num- 
ber of citizens of high standing, that object to the prohibitory law in its present 
form? 

A. I think there are. 

Q. Do you think with that class of people, if an arrangement or modifica- 
tion of the law were made which would close the public bars and otherwise 
restrict the traffic, it would be entirely satisfactory and secure their co-operation 
in the execution of such a law ? 

A. I have no reason to doubt it. I think whatever may be considered 
the best policy or means of restricting the traffic, that they will heartily unite 
in the effort. The temperance associations, as I have reason to believe, are 
unanimously in favor of a continuance of the present law. 

Q. Do the class of gentlemen, to whom you have alluded, object to certain 
provisions of the present law as interfering much with their private right to 
supply themselves with what they want ? 
77 



610 APPENDIX. 

A. I have heard no special discussion upon that point except what I have 
heard here in this investigation. 1 have obtained more knowledge of the 
views of the people of Cambridge upon this question from this investigation 
than from any other source. 

Q. If you were to have a law that closed the public bars, but permitted all 
hotels and victualling saloons to furnish guests with whatever they called for, 
and groceries to furnish to customers to carry away what their families might 
want, do you think that such a law for Boston and Cambridge and the vicinity, 
would operate as well or better, or not as well as the present law ? 

A. That would depend very much upon how the community felt about it. 

Q. Do you think that the community would cordially co-operate in the 
execution of such a law as that ? 

A. If the community believed that such a law would best accomplish the 
purpose for which the law was enacted, undoubtedly they would give their 
co-operation. But I think they stand in this position, — they feel that the 
present law has not exhausted its potency ; that it is still under trial, and that 
its real efficiency has not been carried out into executive action sufficiently to 
fully test it. I think, therefore, if the community generally were satisfied that 
this law was going to accomplish the purpose, they would prefer to have it 
remain. If, however, they thought that it was not going to accomplish the 
purpose, they would prefer something else, which would be more effectual. 

Q. Is it not desirable, in your opinion, in making a law, to remove from it 
such features as beget opposition and hinder its execution ? 

A. Certainly; that is too plain a proposition to be questioned for a 
moment. 

Q. Are there not certain provisions in this law which do beget that oppo- 
sition and which do hinder its execution ? 

A. That has been a very prominent question, but I think that one great 
source of embarrassment has been that the people have not hitherto thought 
this was to be a stable law. If they understood that the present law was the 
settled policy of the Commonwealth, and that there was no probability of a 
change, I think there would be greater efforts to execute it. As long as the 
question is kept open and under agitation, these different views in regard to 
the law will come in. The policy of enacting a license law involving tho 
necessity of appointing persons as agents to sell, introducing an element of 
grea/t mischief into the municipal corporations, the difficulty of making that 
selection which would be satisfactory on the one hand ; and the present law, 
with its State agencies upon the other, present the simple problem to be 
determined. 

Q. Is not the question one of great difficulty ? 

A. Undoubtedly the most difficult in our legislation. 

Q. What is your opinion of this attempt to grapple with all the difficulties 
and make a clean reach, and make the law as perfect as possible ? Must you 
not accommodate the provisions of your law and its execution somewhat to 
public sentiment ? 

A. Undoubtedly the law must depend somewhat upon the public senti- 
ment for its enforcement. The fact, however, is that the law is one of the 
best exponents of what the public sentiment is. 



APPENDIX. 611 

Q. Do you lay that down as a general rule ? 

A. Yes, sir. I do not know to what we can better look, as determining 
public sentiment, than to the law. 

Q. Take the Fugitive Slave Law, for instance ; was that law in accordance 
with the public opinion of this country ? 

A. I think that it was as long as it existed. There were exceptions, of 
course, but I think that the people generally deemed it better to continue the 
law than to overthrow it. 

Q. The only question I ask, is, was it an exponent of public opinion upon 
that subject ? 

A. Taking all things into consideration I think that it must have been ; 
as a moral question it was not. 

Q. But was the law an exponent of the opinion of the people upon that 
subject ? 

A. I can only answer the question in the way that I have already done. 
I think it was not the exponent of the highest moral sense of the majority of 
individual men, but I think it was considered as being the best policy for the 
time being. 

Q. But may not a law, by the maneuvering of members of Congress, or 
other legislative bodies, be put upon the statute books, that is not an exponent 
of the opinion of the people ? 

A. No doubt, sir. 

Q. Such a law as that, then, would not be an exponent of public sentiment ? 

A. No, sir ; but such a law would not long remain. 

Q. But suppose the people disregarded the law and let it remain, and did 
not execute it. Is it then an exponent of public sentiment ? 

A. I think that it is. For instance, in our Commonwealth there are cer- 
tain laws which are inoperative. Take that against lotteries. They are 
practised in one way or another, yet the general law is against them, but it is 
not enforced. 

Q. The probability is that public sentiment does not side with the law ? 

A. I think, as a general thing, without assuming to be very exact upon 
the question, that under our Constitution, any law that remains upon the 
statute book, is an expression of the popular sentiment of the people. Whether 
that law be right or wrong, is another question, of course. 

Q. Is the Sunday law an expression of popular sentiment, — the law that 
a man shall not ride out on Sunday, at any time before twelve o'clock at 
night ? 

A . I really am not aware that that is a violation of the Sunday law. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) The question is whether the law itself is an 
expression of public sentiment, and not whether any particular act is right or 
wrong. 

A. I think it is, sir. There is no reason why the present Legislature 
should not repeal that law if it is not an exponent of public sentiment. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Then you would get at the opinion of the public 
from the law that remains upon the statute book, rather than from universal 
conduct ? 

A. That is, I think, one of the best tests of what public opinion is. 



612 APPENDIX. 

Q. And not the conduct of individuals ? 

A. No, sir ; not the conduct of particular individuals. 

Q. Nor of the great majority of individuals ? 

A. Legislation is considered as an expression of the will of the 
majority. 

Q. Do you know the opinions of the Mayor and City Government of 
Cambridge upon this subject ? 

A. No, sir ; I have never consulted with the Mayor particularly upon this 
subject. 

Q. Do you know whether or not he is in favor of a license law ? 

A. No, sir. I have an impression, however, that he probably may be in 
favor of a license law ; but perhaps I ought not to state even that, as I really 
have no data from which to speak. 

Q. Would it not be easier for the State Constabulary to close the liquor- 
places, and prevent the sale of liquor in Cambridge, inasmuch as the people 
could supply their demands in Boston ? 

A. I do not perceive that that would make any difference. 

Q. If the people of Cambridge were isolated, and could not get what they 
wanted to drink without a great deal of difficulty, would they resort to means 
of supplying the demand ? 

A. They would have a great deal of difficulty in obtaining a supply to 
replace what was taken from them, and a great deal of inconvenience would 
result ; but, undoubtedly, situated as Cambridge is, near to Boston, they could 
replace their stock quite easily, and those places which were closed would 
perhaps be replenished and keep it again. 

Q. But could not the people supply themselves without going to those 
places ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Mr. Child asked you whether a license, permit- 
ting hotels and grocers and victuallers and apothecaries, would not be 
preferable to the present law. Do you not conceive that that clanse 
concerning victuallers, would cause victualling-houses to degenerate into 
simple dram-shops ? 

A. That has been the tendency of those places, although I can conceive 
that they could be kept under such surveillance and espionage as to correct 
that tendency ; but that has unquestionably been their tendency heretofore. 

Q. Was your present Mayor elected with any particular reference to this 
subject ? 

A. Not that I know of. 

Q. Was not the previous Mayor opposed to a license law ? 

A. I think that he was. I should say that a year or two ago, previous to 
the enforcement of the seizure clause, there was more generally a feeling that 
some change was desirable than there is now. 

Q. You think the vigorous enforcement of this law would make friends to 
the prohibitory law 2 

A. I think that its enforcement has that tendency. I think the feeling 
has changed very much of late, and that the people now desire to see the 
present law in its full operation. I think that the vast majority of the people 



APPENDIX. 613 

are in favor of doing something to suppress intemperance. If the present law 
will do it, they are in favor of the present law. If it will not do it, I think 
they are in favor of some change. 

Q. Did you ever know a license law anywhere that did anything to sup- 
press the sale of liquor ? 

A. I think that in some places they have been somewhat effective, but 
how far I cannot determine. They have at times in a measure restricted 
individuals from selling ; whether such restriction has actually diminished 
intemperance, or the evils of intemperance, I cannot tell. 

Q. Have they ever really restricted the sellers ? 

A. My recollection is, that formerly in Cambridge the prosecutions were 
somewhat fluctuating; they were spasmodic; there would be periods of a 
few months in which there would be a pretty active raid upon liquor-sellers, 
and then a suspension of that activity. There has never been, I think, any 
steady pressure. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) There have never, to your knowledge, been any 
effective arrangements for carrying out that law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would not this same State Constabulary and the same arrangements 
that we now have, aid very much in breaking up the unauthorized sale of 
liquor under a license system ? 

A. I have no doubt that a license law could be enforced to a very consid- 
erable extent with the aid of the State Constables ; unquestionably they could 
accomplish much, at least, in confining the sale to authorized places. 

Q. What would be the effect of such a law, leaving licenses subject to 
revocation at the pleasure of the power that granted them, and holding the 
parties strictly to the conditions of the license granted ? 

A. That would be a very excellent provision in case the policy was to 
introduce that law. I think it would be a most necessary provision in case 
the law was adopted. As to the expediency of such a law, I am obliged to 
say I think the present law has not been so fully unfolded in its operations as 
to justify a change, or to render a change expedient. • 

Testimony of Andrew Cushing. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are a city missionary ? 

A. I am engaged in superintending the city missionaries of the City Mis- 
sionary Society, and am to some extent a city missionary. 

Q. How many persons are under your direction ? 

A. Twenty. 

Q. Are they men or women ? 

A. They are partly male and partly female. 

Q. How many years have you been thus employed ? 

A. Twenty-five years. 

Q. With what class of the community do you labor ? 

A. More especially among the poor, the destitute and the vicious. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state as briefly as you can, anything that 
you may deem important, as bearing upon the question here at issue ? 



614 APPENDIX. 

A. My experience coincides with that of all who have sought the moral 
elevation of the poor, that intemperance is the great obstacle that we have 
to contend with ; that were it not for the use of alcoholic drinks, the vocation 
of missionaries and almoners of charity, and others of that class, would be 
well nigh gone. A very small proportion of those who require aid, and a 
very small proportion of those for whom it is especially desirable to make 
efforts for their moral improvement, are of the strictly temperate class, or of 
those who have not been influenced and brought into their degradation by 
the intemperance of others with whom they associated. I believe that so long 
as liquors are sold, that there will be intemperance. I believe that intemper- 
ance is the great cause of suffering and of crime in our community, and 
therefore it is a great evil to license and allow the sale of that which produces 
so much evil. 

Q. So that for the sake of the interests of the poor, the interests of 
morality and religion, and for the sake of the physical comfort of all classes 
of persons, for whom you labor, you earnestly desire the continuance of the 
prohibitory law and the suppression of intemperance ? 

A . Yes, sir ; that is my desire, and I am confirmed in my favorable 
opinion of the prohibitory law, by the judgment of all the missionaries, I 
think, without exception, with whom I am connected in labor, and by very 
many others of other associations, laboring for a similar cause. I have visited 
many thousand families of the poor in this city during the twenty-five years 
that I have been engaged in missionary work, and have also been an almoner 
of other institutions, and connected with other associations of a charitable and 
eleemosynary character, and my position has necessarily brought me in con- 
tact with a large number of the poor, the intemperate and the vicious. 

Q. Do you perceive any way in which a license, extended as broadly as is 
proposed by the petitioners, could operate to restrain intemperance among 
the class of people for whom you feel so much interest ? 

A. I do not know what the proposition of the petitioners is. 

Q. They propose to grant licenses to hotels, grocers, victuallers and 
apothecaries. , 

A. My remembrance of the state of things that existed under a license 
law in my youth, and my knowledge of human nature leads me to believe 
tbat no license law, which shall be stringent enough to restrain in general, 
those habits of the community which lead to excessive drinking, can ever be 
enforced ; that there would be greater difficulties in the enforcement of such 
a law, than in the enforcement of the present prohibitory law. If the sale is 
very general, the effect will be the same, whether such sale be licensed or 
unlicensed. If the sale is not very general, the poorer classes, and those 
whose vices and crimes are more apparent in the community will not be satis- 
fied. One of the greatest difficulties that we have to contend with is the 
natural jealousy of the higher classes that exists among the poor. They sup- | 
pose, oftentimes, that they are debarred of certain privileges, because they 
are poor, and one of the great efforts of missionaries and others, who seek 
their elevation, is to satisfy them that the better portion of the community 
desire their welfare, and regard them as brethren, and as entitled to every 
right and privilege that they enjoy. If the sale of liquor was confined to the 



APPENDIX. 615 

" better class," as we call them, the masses of the poor would look upon it as 
invidious. They would protest against such a state of things. They would 
take every measure to obtain liquor, and failing in that, they would endeavor 
to bring about a state of public opinion which would permit the free and 
unrestricted use of intoxicating liquors. 

Q. Do you think that such a license law as is contemplated by the peti- 
tioners would be any restriction upon the sale and use of liquor ? Would it 
change the present condition of things, except to throw the protection of the 
law about the trafficker, leaving the sale and use as unrestrained as before ? 

A. I believe that, practically, it would be as unrestrained as now, and 
perhaps still more so. 

Q. Have you noticed any changes of late among the ranks of those for 
whom you labor, in regard to the vice of intemperance ? 

A. I think that within the last few years there has been an increase of 
intemperance in this city both among the poor and among the rich — among 
all classes, perhaps, I might say, with the exception of the more moral and 
upright portion of the commuuity ; but I think that there are causes sufficient 
to account for this increase without placing it as one of the results of the pro- 
hibitory law. During the war there were many of the poor families who, from 
bounties and other sources, had much larger sums of money placed in their 
possession than usual. Many of them had no habits of economy, their whole 
course in life having been to spend all that they could get from day to day. 
Very many of the poor were also in a state of excitement ; their husbands or 
brothers or fathers were in the army, which produced a nervous state of 
excitement, leading to a free use of liquor. It is especially true of many 
foreigners, that anything which grieves them, leads them to intemperance. A 
man, who for the most part, may be a good citizen, perhaps, rarely indulging 
iu the free use of intoxicating liquor, in the case of a death in his family, is 
quite likely to become intoxicated. I have found that among the foreign pop- 
ulation, intoxication is very common under such circumstance. I think that 
the war produced that state of excitement, and in connection with a more 
abundant supply of means, led to the freer use of intoxicating drinks. This 
remark is especially true when applied to the women. 

Q. You think those are two special causes of the increase of intemperance 
among the classes for whom you labor ? 

A. Those are the principal causes. The influence of another class of the 
community in a higher position has acted to encourage this ; I refer to the 
drinking usages of the wealthy, a habit whieh I am afraid is on the increase. 
I think that the habit of drinking among young men is to be attributed to the 
same cause — the state of excitement which was consequent upon the war. 
Some of the young men have been in the army, and others who have not been 
in the army have been under unnatural excitement. The condition of affairs 
incident upon the war led to reckless expenditure and speculation and Sab- 
bath-breaking upon the part of communities ; I frequently hear the remark 
made by young men who have been in other parts of the country that people 
there are not so Puritanical as in Massachusetts, and therefore they like the 
place better ; they wish to be relieved, as far as may be, from the restraints 
of law and of public sentiment. 



616 APPENDIX. 

Q. This has not exclusive reference to the drinking usages of the 
community ? 

A. No, not exclusively. Years ago it was very unusual to meet a man in 
the streets smoking ; now you can scarcely go a rod, without meeting not only 
men but boys using tobacco freely. 

Q. Of what proportion of those who receive aid from your hands or from 
the hands of those under your direction, are native Americans? 

A. The society with which I am more immediately connected— the Boston 
City Missionary Society — is primarily a religious society, and only incidentally 
e.eemosynary. 

Q. Therefore your labors are chiefly confined to Americans ? 

A. Yes, sir; but for about twenty years I have been one of a committee 
of the Howard Benevolent Society, and have been brought in contact with 
the poor through that agency, and the applications for aid to that society 
have been very largely from foreigners, but I am not able to say in what 
proportion. 

Q. Would you think it more or less than seventy-five per cent. ? 

A . The Howard Benevolent Society was organized more especially to aid 
the poor who had seen better days, and to a considerable extent it confines its 
charity to a better class of the poor, though not exclusively by any means. 
In some wards I suppose that seventy-five per cent, of the persons relieved 
are foreigners ; in others it is a less proportion. In reference to the general 
charity, I should say that more than three-fourths, perhaps seven-eighths, is 
called for by the foreign population. 

Q. That is, taking the charities of the city as a whole ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you ever hear any expression of desire upon the part of those who 
were the subject of your labors, in regard to the banishment of liquors and the 
removal of the temptation from them ? 

A. Very often. Many of them are temperate, but have suffered in their 
families from intemperance, and they deprecate the increase of temptation, 
and often express the wish that the sale of liquor might be stopped. 

Q, (By Mr. Child.) Do you know anything in regard to the extent of 
the 3ale of liquor among the poor ? 

A. I cannot give any definite answer. I can only say the places are very 
many where liquor can be obtained. I am speaking now of the past few 
years, and not of any particular date. 

Q. The places are right around them, are they not, and in the portions of 
the city where the poorer classes live ? 

A. I think it is not necessary for a man to go far to obtain liquor in 
Boston. I think sometimes that the poor prefer to be in those parts of the 
city where it is sold. The question has often been asked, whether, if the 
liquor places were closed in one locality, and left open in a neighboring 
locality, the use of liquor would be diminished ? My own judgment is, that it 
would not. They have a wonderful ingenuity in finding places where it is 
sold, although I find it very difficult sometimes to teach them where to find 
the house of God. They never know the street in that case, and have no 



APPENDIX. 617 

acquaintance with the locality ; but they have no difficulty in finding a place 
where they can obtain liquor. 

Q. Do they carry liquor into their houses ? 

A. Some of them do ? 

Q. Do you see any intemperance among the women and children ? 

A. I think there has been an increase of intemperance among the women 
within the last few years. 

Q. How long have you held your present position ? 

A. Twenty-five years. 

Q. During the time you have held that position, has there been an increase, 
or a decrease of intemperance ? Is there more or less intemperance among the 
poorer classes now than there was twenty years ago ? 

A. There has been a very great increase of population, and that increase 
has been very largely of a foreign element. The native American population 
of the city is nearly stationary, I suppose. The foreign element has increased 
very largely. There have been a great many who were in the habit of drink- 
ing, in the towns and in the rural districts, that have flocked to the city, where 
their wants can be supplied. It is very difficult to draw a comparison between 
one period and another. I think there has been more intemperance in 
amount, but whether there has been in proportion to the increase of the 
American population I think is very doubtful. 

Q. Has there been an increase of drinking among the young men and 
among people in the higher walks of life ? 

A. I have less opportunity to judge; but, so far as I have observed, my 
impression is that there has been an increase within a few years, in the habits 
of drinking, among what is called the better portion of society. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) How would it be with the middle class of our 
American population ? 

A. It is very difficult to draw a line between classes when we have no 
classes, or ought to have none in the community. Those who are regarded as 
the higher classes are often really the lower. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I do not like any distinctions. I do not believe in 
classes of any sort, except where the distinction is based on good morals and 
upright conduct. 

A . I believe that men of good morals and upright conduct, are generally 
total abstinence men. 

Q. And they would be, whether there was any law or not, whether there 
was a prohibitory or a license law ? 

A . Those who have arrived at years of maturity, and perhaps, passed into 
middle life with confirmed habits, I suppose would be able to maintain their 
habits of sobriety ; but their children, with the temptation that surround them, 
and young men coming from the country where they have not been under the 
temptations which exist here, I am afraid would be very likely to grow up in 
intemperance, so that the temperate class thirty years hence would be much 
smaller than at the present time. 

Q. Is it not, after all, a question whether any law can be so enforced as to 
get rid of liquor and its use ? No effect will be produced by law unless it 
operates to stop the sale of liquor ? 
78 



618 APPENDIX. 

A. A law upon the statute book, unless enforced, will be nothing; but I 
believe the law has an influence in curtailing the amount of liquor drank. 

Q. Do you not believe that liquor has been largely bought by people of 
respectable standing in society, in violation of this law ? 

A. I have no special means of judging. 

Q. What is your opinion ? 

A. I have no doubt but that there are a great many men in the community 
who, in the main, are temperate, and good citizens, that for culinary and other 
purposes purchase liquor. 

Q. If you could supply the demand for proper purposes, and exclude 
liquor for improper purposes, would it not add force to the law ? 

A. If, by any law, the use of alcoholic stimulants could be confined to the 
arts and to cooking, I have no doubt that intemperance would diminish. 

Q. Do you believe that is possible under any state of law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then is it not a fact that we want that law which, under a proper state 
of things, will go the farthest towards confining alcohol to its proper uses ? 

A. Not necessarily. The responsibility, it seems to me, should be left with 
the man that sells, and he should take the consequences from the hand of man 
and from the hand of God. I think it is not necessary or proper for the Legisla- 
ture or the people through the Legislature to protect a man in doing that 
which will produce a great amount of evil, without any corresponding amount 
of good. 

Q. The question seems to be this : This liquor is an article of commerce, 
made so by the laws of the government ; now, if the Legislature seek to 
restrain the sale, believing that thereby they can root out the evil of intem- 
perance, and they do restrain that evil as far as they can, do they thereby 
become responsible for the portion they do not restrain ? 

A . A license is something more than a restraint ; it is a permission to do. 

Q. The proposition is this : The Legislature, seeing that the common use 
of liquor produces evil, look to see how far it can be restrained, and deter- 
mine that they will restrain it to a certain limit ; do they thereby sanction 
the portion that they do not restrain ? 

A. If they allow any man to sell for the purpose of beverage, they do. Il 
any man is allowed to sell intoxicating liquor as a beverage, and is protected 
by the government in that sale, he paying a certain sum therefor, the govern- 
ment thereby becomes responsible for any evil which may result therefrom. 

Q. If the government makes a law restraining such sale, does it thereby 
become responsible for the evils, resulting from the sale, that it does not 
restrain ? 

A . The government is responsible if it protects any man in the sale. 

Q. A man is protected by his common right ; he has a common right to 
sell an article of commerce, that is made an article of commerce by the laws 
and constitution of the United States. 

A. If there was a common right existing, I should not suppose that there 
was any necessity for granting licenses. 

Q. Without any law upon the subject, every man would have the right to 
sell this article of commerce as freely as he does sugar, tea or cofFee. 



APPENDIX. ' 619 

A. He would have a legal right, but no moral right. 

Q. I am speaking of the legal right. Now, if the Legislature undertake 
to restrain the sale, and have done so as far as they can, and intend to do it 
still, do they thereby sanction what they do not restrain ? 

A. Perhaps if the Legislature should pass a law that persons who sold 
under such and such circumstances should be amenable and liable to punish- 
ment, the government might not be responsible for that which was sold. But if 
there is any allowance, upon the part of the government, of the right to sell, 
and protection is given in that right, then I think it is responsible. 

Q. You spoke of its being more difficult to execute a license law than the 
present law ; would not the present prohibitory law be equally effective in 
breaking up all unauthorized sales, if some were permitted to sell ? 

A. I think not. I think that a license law would increase the difficulties. 
I think it has an injurious effect upon the community to let men of promi- 
nence go unpunished, when those of far less intelligence and importance, who 
have broken the law, are punished ; but it seems to be the custom of society to 
treat large swindlers with greater leniency than those who swindle in less 
amounts. 

Q. Then, I suppose, you think that the action of the State Constabulary 
is not proper; if they close the lesser, and not the larger places where liquor 
is sold ? 

A. I think they should all be closed, and it is only a question of expedi- 
ency where they begin. 

Q. Is not that one of the great difficulties that surround the whole sub- 
ject ; the law undertakes to assume so much and fails to accomplish it ? 

A. I do not believe that the law has made matters worse, even in Boston ; 
certainly it has not in the country. There, there has been a more marked 
improvement. But even if it had, there would not, therefore, necessarily be 
any wisdom in repealing the law. I suppose that the law of nations, which 
made the African slave-trade piracy, increased the vigor of that trade, and 
that thousands found a watery grave who would have arrived safely on our 
shores, if the law had not been in operation. 

Q. St. Paul's rule was not to do evil that good might come ; do you hold 
the reverse of that to be true, that it is right to do good that evil may come ? 

A. It is not right to wish evil in any way. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) The question assumes that evil will come out of 
good. Is there any such connection between the doing of good as a cause, 
and evil flowing from it as an effect ? 

A . It never follows as an effect, properly, though good may be, and often 
is, the occasion of evil. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) In such a case, is it best to continue the good ? 

A. Yes, sir. The gospel of Christ has been the occasion of a great deal of 
evil as well as of a great deal of good in the world, but I think it ought to be 
continued. 

Q. If the law does not check the evil at all, though well intended and 
good in its principle, is it wise to continue it ? 

A. The law, in my judgment, has not had a fair trial. The authorities 
have not seemed, in years past, to manifest any great desire to enforce the law. 



620 • APPENDIX. 

Those who have been convicted of violations, have appealed, and the cases 
have been carried up from court to court, and the question of the enforcement 
of the law has never been considered as settled. I therefore wish to give a 
longer opportunity for a fair trial. I believe that if all temperance men and 
all who profess to desire the promotion of the cause of temperance would be 
united in their efforts in vigorously enforcing the law, we should soon have 
very different results from any that we have yet seen. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Since it has been claimed by the authorities of the 
city, for so many years, that the law could not be enforced, do you think it 
unwise in the Constabulary to attack the enemy in the weakest place and get 
the public accustomed to the operation of the law, and thus pave the way to its 
complete enforcement ? 

A. I can conceive that such may be the best course, though I have had 
no experience in such matters. 

Testimony of Rev. George Trask. 
Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you reside in Fitchburg ? 
A. I do. 

Q. You are a minister of the gospel ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You have been in the habit of travelling about the State, I suppose ? 

A. Yes, sir; I have for eighteen years been travelling through this State 
and portions of other States. 

Q. Will you give your judgment of the sentiment of the religious people 
and of the clergymen, so far as you are acquainted with it, upon the subject 
of temperance ? 

A. I mingle with different denominations of clergymen, and stand in their 
pulpits. I mingle with every denomination except the Catholic, and I 
might except one other, and my impression is that the main body of Christian 
ministers, with the exception perhaps of Catholics, and possibly, one other 
denomination, are in favor of the present prohibitory law, in the proportion 
of nineteen to twenty. I affirm this upon the basis that I mingle with them. 
I see them at the religious conventions, and at the temperance conventions, 
and think that I affirm whereof I know. And what is true of the clergymen 
of the various denominations, is, in my judgment, true of religious people 
generally, of serious people, of devout people. On the whole, they have con- 
fidence in this prohibitory law ; they do not deem it perfect, I presume, but 
they have confidence in it. They do not believe that it has had a fair trial. 
I do not believe that it has had a fair trial, and I will give some reasons why 
I think that it has not had a fair trial. The general wish is that the law may 
have a fair trial before we go further. 

Q. Do the people feel encouraged by the operations of the State Con- 
stabulary ? 

A. I think that encouragement is taken by very many people in that par- 
ticular direction ; indeed I do. I think that the law has worked well in the 
counties where I have been particularly conversant. I think that the law has 
swept the dram-shops clean from some portions of counties and from some 
whole towns. I do not mean that it has done all of its work ; bnt it is on the 



APPENDIX. 621 

way, doing its work. I ought to say, as I am engaged in advocating this law, 
that I am not advocating a law that shall make the rumseller responsible, as 
an editor is responsible for a libel, or as a railroad- is responsible for broken 
bones. I say that I am not advocating a law like that. I have fallen under 
the imputation of advocating a license law. A very jocose editor, in a very 
jocose manner, has published that the " anti-tobacco apostle has said that he 
was in favor of a license law." I have suffered a little in that direction. 1 
do not mean to throw any imputation in any direction by making this remark. 
I have decided opinions on this matter of temperance — having looked at 
it for a great many years. I have been with my friend, brother Child, a 
great many years in this matter. I came up under the economy of a license 
law. One of the best men in the town sold rum — doctors, justices of the 
. peace and the like, all sold it. I and my fellow-boys went and bought it. We 
drank it, and our friends went and bought it and drank it, and drank it freely. 
We all drank it, and sometimes drank too much. We all got a little boozy, 
and generally, fifty years ago, we were all so boozy that we did not know that 
we were boozy at all. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you mean all ? 

A. I will qualify that. I will say this, that the license law, under which I 
was born, was practised under the very best of circumstances. If we had 
any good men in the community to sell rum, we had them to sell it, we had 
the solid ones to sell it. If there was ever any such a thing as good rum — the 
real St. Croix, beautiful and slippery and oily — we had it, and got drunk 
upon it. My playmates got drunk upon it, and some of them went down to 
their graves drunkards. In view of that, by the grace of God, I am here to 
speak to you upon this point. I went through a splendid economy once — an 
economy that made me and my boys all drunkards, to some extent, and it 
made the nation a nation of drunkards. We had the best license law in this 
world — a law under which godly men sold rum, and no others, and sold it 
with great care, and we all got drunk. I do not believe that we reach results 
at once. We are slow ; we are all of us slow. The Patriarchal economy, 
the Jewish economy, and the Christian economy, so we come. So we have 
economies in temperance. We may depend upon that. Now, whether that 
economy of brother Child is to be ranked as an economy or not, I am not 
going to state ; but I say that this prohibitory law stands, in my mind, as an 
economy. I do not mean by this that there may not be something better. I 
am going for something higher. It is this : that the man who sells rum, as he 
has the money for it, the profits of it, the advantages of it, must abide the 
consequences. I would say to him : " You have a right to sell rum, if you 
do not trespass upon my rights ; " and I speak to my brother Child, as a 
lawyer, and ask him whether there is not a law as old as the world, just like 
this, "Enjoy your rights, but don't you trespass upon mine." Now, I say to 
the rumseller, under any circumstance : " You are trespassing upon my rights ; 
you are manufacturing paupers ; you are manufacturing firemen to burn 
my barns. Sir, enjoy your rights, but I prosecute you upon the score of 
trespass. I drag you up by the old law of nature, under which you hold 
your rights, and tell you not to trespass upon mine." I do not mean by this 
that I would not carry this law of prohibition higher and higher ; but I 



622 APPENDIX. 

would have a law (and shall have it by and by), that every man shall be 
responsible for what he does. We shall get up to a higher economy and shall 
prevent the business. . 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Is the sentiment of the people of this State, so 
far as you know, decidedly in favor of prohibition, instead of a license law ? 

A. Yes, sir ; the people that I mingle with are. 

Q. How is it taking the mass of people generally, as far as you can judge ? 

A. Well, I represent the representatives of the mass. I say that the 
people of this State generally, who are friendly to Christ, who are friendly to 
sound, beautiful, and elevated morals, who are favorable to liberty and truth, 
morality and reform, I say that the most of them, nineteen out of twenty, 
are in favor of a prohibitory law. Some of us have gone higher, and wish 
something higher, but we are going to have the prohibitory law carried 
through ; we are not going to give it up. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you think that there ought to be a law against 
chewing tobacco ? 

A. Brother Child, I told you before I took the stand, that if you should 
ask me that question I would not say a word about it. I am not bound to 
answer that question. Do not ask me that question because I do not want to 
lie. I told you that I would not answer any such question. 

Q. You say that you are in favor of the prohibitory law ; are you not in 
favor of a law that will most effectually check the evils of intemperance ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. You are not in favor of any particular law are you ? 

A. I am too much of a man to be wedded to any sectionality. I merely 
go for the simple right. 

Q. Is it not really a question whether there may not be modifications of 
this law which would render it more effective than it is now, in the city of 
Boston, and in other parts of the Commonwealth ? 

A. I reply very directly to this very proper question, that I see that 
human nature is the same in Fitchburg that human nature is in Boston ; that 
the gospel of Christ is the same in one place that it is in the other ; therefore 
I say that the law should be the same in one place that it is in the other, or 
else we shall get into interminable difficulties. 

Q. Do I understand you, then, that if any modification of this law would 
make it more efficient, taking the world as it is, and enable it better to effect 
the object intended, that you would be in favor of that modification ? 

A. Upon the supposition that those modifications are not a compromise 
with anything immoral or sinful. I should say that it becomes us all to be 
looking upon this question to see if we can accommodate matters. 

Q. Do you consider it a sin, under all circumstances, to sell wine, cider, 
and spirituous liquors ? 

A. I think that a man who is deputized by the" government to sell wine, 
brandy and other drinks, has a right to sell to me if I produce a bit of paper 
from a respectable physician, stating that I need it. 

Q. Do you believe that it is a sin to sell, under every circumstance, with- 
out that " bit of paper?" 



APPENDIX. 623 

A. When a man is in perfect health, and does not need cider, nor any- 
thing stronger, he does not need that intoxicating principle that is found in 
cider. If he does not need it, it will injure him, and because it will injure 
him, it is immoral and sinful for him to use it. 

Q. The question that I wish you to answer, is this : Is it under every cir- 
cumstance, a sin to sell a glass of cider for a beverage ? 

A. I answer, that if the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts 
prohibit the selling of strong or intoxicating drinks, it is a sin, because the 
transgression of the law is a sin in all cases. 

Q. The transgression of what law do you refer to ? 

A. The laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 

Q. Always ? 

A. The transgression of the law is sin. 

Q. Do you believe that the transgression of every law that we have upon 
the statute books, is a sin ? 

A. Can you specify a law which it is not a sin to transgress ? 

Q. Would the transgression of a law that should go against the Christian 
religion, be a sin ? 

A . There is no such law. 

Q. But suppose there was ? 

A. I would stamp it under foot. 

Q. So I supposed. The question then returns : Is it a sin to sell a glass 
of cider as a beverage ? I should like to have you answer it. 

A. When a man does not need that beverage it is a sin. 

Q. It is a sin then, to sell him what he does not need ? 

A. It is a sin to sell him what he does not need, and when it will not bene- 
fit him. The magnitude of the sin is another question. 

Q. Who is to be the judge of what a man needs ? 

A. A man's conscience. 

Q. You are not, then, to judge for me nor I for you ? 

A. That maybe. 

Q. You agree to that, do you not ? 

A. That may be. 

Q. But is that not true ? 

A . Well, sometimes it is true ; but a man may be wrong even when he is 
conscientious. Paul was wrong when he was conscientious, and you may be 
wrong if you drink cider. 

Q. You, then, decline to answer whether the drinking of cider as a bever- 
age is, in every case a sin. 

A. No, I do not ; I decline nothing. 

Q. Is it then, a sin per se, in your opinion ? 

A. In every case where a man is properly informed of the nature of cider, 
and then sells it to a man who does not need it, he does wrong. He is tres- 
passing upon the rights of a man, because he is injuring him. 

Q. Is it wrong in all cases to sell or drink a glass of wine as a beverage ? 

A. If I were sick, I would drink a gallon if the doctor told me to. 

Q. I am not speaking of sickness. Do you believe that it is wrong to 
drink a glass of wine as a beverage ? 



624 APPENDIX. 

A. I do, as a beverage. 

Q. Do you believe that it is a sin ? 

A. I do believe it to be a sin, firstly, because I believe intoxicating wines 
to be injurious to the human system ; secondly, it is wrong, from the beauti- 
ful principle that if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no more 
forever. 

Q. Is the act wrong in itself, or is it wrong in its tendency ? 

A. It is wrong relatively, and wrong in itself. 

Q. I want to ask you one question more; if, in your judgment, the fact 
as to whether a law can or cannot be executed, is not a fair consideration to 
be taken into account in judging of the expediency of an enactment, or of 
the expediency of continuing an enactment ? 

A. That question has been so beautifully answered by the judge from 
Cambridge, that it seems to me that I had better not answer it. 

Q. What is your opinion ? 

A. Just the same as his. 

Q. What is his ? 

A. That when we have a law like the prohibitory law, which commands 
upon the whole, as he thinks, the approval of the majority, all good men 
should turn in upon its side, and press it right through. 

Q. Suppose they will not do that, what will you do in that case ? 

A. We will give them light and love, until they do. We are going to 
have the law, and then wrap it around with light and love, and send it ahead. 
We are not going upon pure legality. If we men, who are for the prohibi- 
tory law, are strong in the gospel of Christ, we shall go ahead. I say with all 
reverence, and without fear of contradiction, that where the law exists, where 
men are earnestly for it, that we have the moral power, the love, the light and 
the prayer, to put it through. If we wrap this law around with light and 
love, and say that it is Christ's law, and we mean to press it through, we will 
do it. 

Q. Do you think that the operation of the State Constabulary, is an exhibi- 
tion of " light and love " in the gospel sense ? 

A. I have not the pleasure of being acquainted with those gentlemen, 
but what I do know of them, I think is certainly in their favor. 

Q. Is that your idea of the " light and love " that is to put this law 
through ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. What is it? 

A. It is that we should have the grip and grandeur of the law, to seize 
upon these villains that are trespassing upon the laws, and then, with our pul- 
pits, our altars, our hearts, and our voices to say — " Let's put it through." 
Let us do it affectionately, earnestly and lovingly, and let the rumseller 
understand that we come to him with the law, and yet we come to him with 
Christ, and full of love ; let us say to him, We are going to prosecute you, 
but we are going to do it in love. 

Q. And as an evidence of your love ? . 

A. Yes, sir; as an evidence of our love. 



APPENDIX. 625 

Testimony of Samuel W. Hodges. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You arc a member of the City Council of Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. For how long have you been ? 

A. This is my second year. 

Q. Are you connected with the Order of the Sons of Temperance ? 

A. I am, and have been for twenty-one years. 

Q. And conversant with temperance organizations generally ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. Will you state, as briefly as you can, what you think will be of service 
in the discussion before us ? 

A . My temperance observations only go back to the time of my original 
connection with the Order of the Sons of Temperance, about twenty-one years 
ago. I do not know that prior to that time I ever took any particular pains 
to instruct myself upon the temperance movements. Since that time I have 
endeavored to keep myself conversant with all the temperance movements in 
the vicinity in which I live. 

Q. Where do you live ? 

A. I came to this city twenty years ago. I had previously lived here, but 
after an absence returned here in 1847, and now reside in Boston. At one 
time I resided in Stoughton, Norfolk County. The sentiment of the people 
of that town was not particularly on the side of temperance ; certainly it was 
not on the side of prohibition. From the time of the commencement of the 
prohibitory law agitation, the minds of the people became more awakened, 
and at the time of the passage of the law, a very large majority of the people 
of that town were in favor of the prohibitory law. I think that the sentiment 
of the people has continued to advance in that respect, from that time to this, 
and I think that to-day the majority of the people in favor of a prohibitory 
law is greater than it was in 1853 or '54. 

I am in correspondence with almost every town in Massachusetts, and the 
remark that I make in regard to Stoughton, will apply almost universally to 
the towns of the Commonwealth, of a less number of inhabitants than ten 
thousand. I am not prepared, perhaps, to make the same statement of towns 
of greater population, and with good facilities for getting intoxicating liquors 
from Boston. I have observed that there is no interest advocated, no com- 
mercial interest, no property interest, that brings out so much feeling on the 
part of men, as does the advocacy of their interest in the sale of intoxicating 
liquors. I find that men connected with that interest will say and do things, 
that I believe they would be ashamed to say or do in connection with any 
other business in the world. 

When I first came to Boston I was in the habit of attending church down 
town. I noticed then, as I would pass down Washington Street, there were a 
large number of places for the sale of liquors and tobacco and cigars, open 
on the Sabbath day, although I never noticed that any persons connected 
with the dry-goods, or similar business, kept their stores open, and was told 
that if such persons did keep their places open on the Sabbath, they would 
be brought before the court. Liquor-sellers, however, were allowed to keep 
their places open. During the last year that has not been the case. My 
79 



626 APPENDIX. 

impression Is that the closing of such places has been caused by the efforts of 
the State Constabulary. 

Q. What is the sentiment of the Sons of Temperance in regard to this 
prohibitory law, as far as you know ? 

A. I think that out of the twenty-four thousand persons connected with 
the Order in Massachusetts, not one thousand could be found who would 
express an opinion in favor of a license laAv. In the city of Boston, I do not 
know of but three persons connected with the Order who favor a license law. 
I do not think that the proportion is so large outside of Boston. I do not 
know of but three ; there may be more. 

Q. Has the subject of a prohibitory law been before the Order ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The more immediate labors of the Order, I suppose, is with indi- 
viduals ? 

A. Yes, sir ; it is not an organization for political purposes, but simply to 
save men from the evils of intemperance. 

Q. Their work, as a temperance work, shows itself to the community ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. So far it may be said to be open work ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do they frequently have open meetings ? 

A. They do; almost every Division in Boston, and some in the country, 
have one or more open meetings every month. 

Q. From what you know of the temperence sentiment of the Common- 
wealth, do you feel that the hopes of temperance men would be elevated or 
depressed by turning now to the experiment of a license law ? 

A. I have never heard a man, whom I considered a temperance man, 
advocate a license law. 

Q. You mean by a temperance man, a man at work in the temperance 
cause ? 

A. I mean a man who sympathizes in the general movement of temper- 
ance, and who is himself a total abstainer from the use of intoxicating 
liquors. 

Q. Have you known of any movement that might be called a temperance 
movement, other than one based upon total abstinence ? 

A. I never have. 

Q. Do you think that there is any propriety in speaking of men who are 
habitual users of liquor, and who merely object to drunkenness, as men 
engaged in the temperance work ? 

A. I cannot see any consistency in such a statement. 

Q. Is there anything further that you would like to state as bearing upon 
this question ? 

A. I do not know as there is. 

Q. What is your opinion of the general position of the temperance cause 
in Boston ? Are you impressed with the idea that the use of liquors is on the 
increase at present ? 

A. So far as my knowledge is concerned, the general sentiment of Boston 
is going the other way. I believe that there are many cases where liquor is 



APPENDIX. 627 

more freely used than it was ten years ago, but it is by men who drank ten 
years ago ; the habit has grown upon them. That is a natural result of the 
use of intoxicating liquors. 

Q. Do you now see as many persons intoxicated, as you did a few years ago ? 

A. No, sir. I have remarked particulary during the last few months, or 
since the first of January, that I have seen fewer persons intoxicated in Bos- 
ton, than I ever did in any previous equal length of time. 

Q. What is your view in regard to the present duty of the city govern- 
ment in regard to promoting the temperance reform by a stricter enforcement 
of the prohibitory law ? 

A. I think that the city government is governed by the general sentiment 
of the people of Boston, and that general sentiment of Boston is governed by 
the moneyed power of the city. I think that the sentiment of the city is in 
favor of the sale of intoxicating liquors. That sentiment has been brought 
about by the fear that the people who now come here to trade, will not con- 
tinue to come here if they cannot have just as much liquor as they want to 
drink. The same men also desire the licensing of other crimes. 

Q. You refer, I suppose, to the houses of ill-fame ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You have been somewhat conversant with the action of the city gov- 
ernment in reference to the sale of liquor. Have you seen anything to per- 
suade you that the power of the government has ever been employed for the 
actual suppression of the traffic, or that the traffic cannot be suppressed by 
the authorities ? 

A. I have never been able to discover by any inquiries, nor by any exam- 
ination of the records, that a single order has been given by the authorities to 
the police that would, in any manner, tend to stop the sale of intoxicating 
liquors. 

Q. Were you a member of the police committee of the city government 
a year or two since ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Were you a member of the special committee, to whom were referred 
the petitions in regard to the enforcement of the law in Boston ? 

A. I was last year. 

Q. Did several gentlemen appear before that committee, urging the exe- 
cution of the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you remember the view of a majority of that committee in regard 
to that matter ? 

A. There was really no majority of the committee. The committee con- 
sisted of eight persons ; three being in favor of the execution of the law and 
three opposed to it, and two would not express an opinion. 

Q. The two other gentlemen were for referring the matter to the Mayor ? 

A. Yes, sir, and to the people of Boston. I think that the report of the 
two gentlemen was as strongly in favor of the execution of the law as the 
report which I signed, but it did not amount to anything in the end. 

Q, On the whole, you feel that the government of Boston is substantially 
in thraldom to the liquor traffic ? 



628 APPENDIX. 

A. I should not desire to make that statement in those words. There wag 
a statement made by the Mayor in his inaugural address to which he said in 
substance (though not in words), that the prohibitory law could not be 
enforced in Boston. I thought at the time that I heard the sentiment uttered 
that, if any gentleman who was not a member of the city government, or any 
gentleman outside the city of Boston, had made such a statement in regard to 
the police force of Boston, — that they could not execute any law of the Com- 
monwealth, — that such a gentleman would have been treated pretty severely 
by the newspapers of Boston. I think that the statement was an unjust impu- 
tation upon the Boston police force. 

Q. During the years that you have resided in Boston, have you ever fallen 
into the mistake of supposing that the city authorities were engaged in the 
business of suppressing the liquor traffic ? 

A. I never have. I have never yet been able to find nor to learn of 
a single order ever issued, proposing to enforce the prohibitory law in Boston. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How many do you say belong to the Sons of Tem- 
perance in this State ? 

A. I think that the figures, upon the first of January, were twenty-four 
thousand ; now there are probably more than twenty-five thousand members. 

Q. Voters ? 

A. No, sir ; men and women. 

Q. This secret organization is composed then of men and women ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The proceedings of the organization, except when they please to have 
a public meeting, are secret from the world, are they not ? 

A. Well, sir, I do not know how far 

Q. Are the societies open to the public to come in and see what is there 
going on ? 

A. No, sir ; not unless they come in at the door in the regular form. 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 629 



EIGHTEENTH DAY. 

Thursday, March 21, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony on 
behalf of the Remonstrants was continued. 

Testimony of Samuel W. Hodges (continued.} 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You gave a pretty decided opinion, yesterday, if I 
understood you rightly, as to the state of feeling throughout the Common- 
wealth being in favor of this prohibitory law ? 

A. I was speaking of the Order of the Sons of Temperance. I have no 
doubt on the other point, but I have not the data to speak of it. 

Q. You confined yourself to the Order, when you spoke of a decided 
majority being in favor of a prohibitory law ? 

A. No, sir; I do not mean to be understood so. I mean to say, that the 
remark I made yesterday was to that effect. I don't consider that I was 
asked to make a statement in regard to others. 

Q. In regard to your means of information as to the opinion of that 
organization, do you derive it from personal knowledge or from w/itten 
information ? 

A. I at the present time occupy the position of Secretary of that Order, 
both of the State and National organizations, and have the written testimony 
to that effect. 

Q. I perceive that among the petitions upon this subject, there are petitions 
from several Orders, of different names. Are those Orders extensively 
established throughout the Commonwealth ? 

A. The Divisions of the Sons of Temperance are extensively circulated 
throughout the Commonwealth. There are 125 Divisions in the State. I 
say 125 ; there may be 126. 

Q. Are these Divisions in so many different towns, or are there several in 
the same town ? 

A. In the city of Boston, there are 14 or 15, and in one or two other 
places, there are more than one. But with a very few exceptions, there is 
simply one in a town. In some of the larger cities, there are two or three. 

Q. How extensively are the other Orders, besides the Sons of Temperance, 
established ? 

A. Well, sir, I have no personal information, and I have not read their 
reports, and am not able to speak with the same knowledge ; but my general 
impression is, that in towns where we have no Sons of Temperance, there are 
organizations of other Orders, and that nearly every town in the Common- 
wealth has something of this kind. I think there are very few towns of more 
than a thousand inhabitants that have not something of this kind. 

Q. And these organizations are composed, in part, of females ? 



630 APPENDIX. 

A. It is optional with each organization, as I understand, to say whether 
they will admit females or not. I think, as a rule, they do. 

Q. You say they are established in every town in the Commonwealth : I 
wish to ask if they are all secret, in the same sense and as far as you under- 
stand the Order of the Sons of Temperance to be secret ? 

A. Every Division of the Sons of Temperance is under the same constitu- 
tion, and governed by the same laws. 

Q. Do you understand that these other organizations are secret societies ? 

A. Yes, sir; I suppose they are. I am not a member of but one other 
of the organizations to which I refer — the Good Templars — but I presume 
their organization is similar to that of the Sons of Temperance, and their 
objects the same. 

Q. Are the same individuals frequently members of different organizations 
— the Sons of Temperance, Good Templars, etc. ? 

A. Very likely they are; but I am not able to speak from personal 
knowledge. 

Q. How extensively in Boston, where you do know, are the members of 
one members of others ? 

A. Well, sir, I am not prepared to answer who are members of other 
organizations, because I am not a member myself; but, as far as I know, the 
proportion is rather small among my immediate acquaintance, although I 
never took pains to inquire. I should not wish to give a direct answer, 
whether they are or are not. 

Q. You said that the temperance people — those whom you call temperance 
people — generally were in favor of the law. What do you mean by that 
term? 

A. I answered that yesterday. I mean a person who gives his influence 
and labor on the side of the temperance movement, with temperance men, 
and who is himself personally a total abstinence man. That is what I 
consider a temperance man — nothing short of it. 

Q. Then, if a man don't give his influence and co-operation with temper- 
ance men, although he is a total abstinence man, you would not, under your 
definition, call him a temperance man ? 

A. If he gives his influence on the side of the opposition, I should not 
consider him a temperance man. A I'.ian might be only negative in his influ- 
ence, and be a total abstinence man, (which is the disposition of some people.) 
I might call that man a temperance man. 

Q. You "might." Would you ? 

A. Yes, sir; I think I might. If his influence was only negative, and he 
was a total abstinence man, I should call him a temperance man. 

Q. You would be more clear if he took part in the movement ? 

A. Of course I should. 

Q. What do you mean by taking part ? Do you want him to join these 
secret societies ? 

A. No, sir; I don't ask him to do that. I might illustrate it in this way. 
If I should know a man who attended church meetings, and pretended to be 
a church-member, but whose private practice was in favor of gambling or any 



APPENDIX. 631 

other species of licentiousness, I should not call him a Christian, although he 
might talk on that side, and might be nominally connected with the church. 

Q. I understood you to say, that generally there is no distinction of sex in 
regard to membership of these societies ? 

A. No, sir. It is optional with the Sons of Temperance. I don't know, I 
only presume, in regard to the others. 

Q. Is there any class in the community who are not admitted ? 

A. Persons under fourteen years of age are not admitted. 
Q. Is there any other distinction ? 

A. The distinction of moral character, sir. 

Q. Any other ? 

A . I will read the provision in the constitution in regard to that matter ; 
it is but five lines : " Persons fourteen years of age and upwards, pos- 
sessing a character for integrity, and who have not been rejected by or 
expelled from any other Division within six months, shall be eligible to 
membership." 

Q. What proportion of the members, so far as you are acquainted, are 
females, or young people under twenty-one years of age ? 

A. The proportion of females is about twelve to ten. 

Q. More females than males ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How is it with regard to those under twenty-one years of age ? 

A. I have no means of knowing. I should think that 40 percent., possi- 
bly, are males under twenty-one ; perhaps 10 per cent, under eighteen. 

Q. You would not embrace, then, a great number of voters in your 
twenty-four thousand ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. So that, when you speak of the twenty-four thousand members of that 
Order, their opinion does not indicate very distinctly what the opinion of the 
people of the State is ? 

A. Yes, sir; as they are really representative men in the towns in which 
they live. 

. Q. That may be or may not ; but, as a matter of fact, you have no defi- 
nite information what the opinion of the people is, further than what is derived 
from your knowledge of the membership of this institution ? 

A. No more than I can judge of the strength of the Christian religion by 
taking simply the church-members. 

Q. You speak of being somewhat conversant with this city. How long 
have you been a resident of Boston ? 

A. Six years. For ten years previous to that I was doing business in 
Boston, and here almost every day. 

Q. In your opinion, is there a great deal of intemperance in Boston ? 

A. I should think there was, sir. 

Q. Do you think it has increased within the last ten years ? 

A % I stated yesterday that I thought it had decreased very sensibly within 
the last four or five years. 

Q. What particular facts or means of information have you upon which to 
base that opinion ? 



632 APPENDIX. 

A. First, I will speak of the locality in which I live. When I came to 
Boston, there were in the immediate vicinity of my house six or seven places 
where intoxicating drinks were sold. Intending to locate there, I had an 
interest in having the neighborhood as clear as possible. I used my influence 
individually, and I do not know, in the vicinity where those shops were 
located, a single place where intoxicating drinks are sold at the present time. 

Q. Have you any other facts showing the decrease, except the diminution 
of the places where liquors are sold, within your personal observation ? 

A . Passing up and down Washington Street Sundays, I found a large 
number of places open when I first came to town. I have passed up that 
street within the last four weeks, on the Sabbath, and I did not discover one 
place open. 

Q. Have you made any observation as to whether there is a greater or less 
number of drunkards now than formerly ? 

A . 1 do not see anything near the number that I used to see in the streets. 

Q. Still, if the daily arrests increase, should you not infer from that that 
drunkenness and intemperance had increased ? 

A. No, sir. Previous to 1864 it was apparently for the interest of the 
Chief of Police to show that the police of Boston were doing all they could 
to suppress intemperance, and consequently the number of arrests was 
growing smaller. Since the establishment of the State Constabulary, it has 
apparently been for the interest — that is, it is understood to be for the interest 
— of the Chief of Police to report an increase of drunkenness, if possible, and 
he has so done. 

Q. Well, what means of information have you, by which you arrive at that 
conclusion ? 

A. Direct personal observation. 

Q. Do you mean to say that your suspicion of the dishonesty of the Chief 
of Police and Deputy-Chief is sufficient to outweigh the positive statements 
made by them under oath ? 

A. I do not accuse them of dishonesty, in any shape whatever. They 
follow instructions. 

Q. Are people of color anywhere members of these institutions to which 
you have referred ? 

A. They are of the Sons of Temperance, and I presume of the others, 
though I do not know. 

Q. Are they of the Temple of Honor ? 

A. I think they have the word " white " in their constitution. I am very 
positive of it. I know the organization, but I am not a member of it. 

Q. (Reading from the Constitution of the Temple of Honor.) " All white 
persons of good moral character ? " 

A. Yes, sir; I think the word "white" is in their constitution. It is not 
in ours, and I think it is not in the Good Templars. 

Q. Have you any colored peoole connected with your Order ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How many ? 

A. I cannot tell the number ; they are not returned separately. We count 
them as men and women. We make no distinction in that respect. 



APPENDIX. 633 

Q. Have you any means of knowing how many there are, or whether there 
are any considerable number ? 

A. I could ascertain by writing to the different Divisions, and asking them 
to give me the number. We have one Division in Boston composed entirely, 
I believe, of colored people. There may be some white persons among them. 

Q. Does not that embrace all the colored people who belong to the Order ? 

A. No, sir; it may in Boston, because they naturally go with their own 
people. 

Q. Are there any colored people in Boston belonging to your own 
Division ? 

A. Not to the one to which I belong. I do not know about the others. 

Q. Do you know a single white Division in Boston that has colored people 
belonging to it ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. (By Mr. Mixer.) You have been connected with the city government 
one year previous to the present ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you aware whether the government of the city has paid any bills 
for refreshments at any time, which were understood to include or which were 
known to include liquors ? 

A. Not since my connection with the government; but I have been told 
that it has been done previous to that time. I cannot speak from positive 
knowledge, except during my own connection. The city government passed 
a resolution that no portion of any money should be expended for intoxicating 
liquors to be used as a beverage ; and I believe that was directly and honestly 
carried out during the year 1866, and I think it will be during 1867. 

Q. Are you aware of its having been done previously ? 

A. I have never been present, and consequently cannot say as to that. I 
have no doubt it has been. 

Q. Have you had any testimony from any persons concerned in the 
matter ? 

A. I have had individuals tell me so; I do not vouch for it. I have no 
doubt about it in my own mind. 

Q. Were you conversant with the fact of the meeting of an association of 
physicians in this city, a year or two since, who occupied this hall ? 

A. I was conversant with the fact of such an association being in the city, 
and a portion of the time in charge of the city government. 

Q. Was it during the last year ? 

A . No, sir. I think it was the year previous to my connection with the 
city government. 

Q. And you cannot testify, personally, with regard to anything of that 
kind ? 

A. I cannot personally testify with regard to anything of that kind. 

Testimony of Calvin A. Richards. 
Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are among the petitioners for a license law ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you a dealer in liquors in Boston ? 
80 



634 APPENDIX. 

A. I have been, sir. 

Q. Are you at present ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state to the Committee what considerations 
and what views influenced you in asking for a license law ? What are your 
reasons ? 

A. In brief, I should say that they were to regulate and protect me in my 
business. I ask for a law of regulation, that I may have some control over 
my business myself, and that I may conduct it in a respectable and lawful 
manner. 

Q. It was not any part of your purpose that a law should be enacted to 
restrict your business ? 

A. I should be perfectly willing to come under any restrictions that would 
enable me to carry on my business in a respectable and lawful manner. 

Q. And permit the sale itself? 

A. That is the natural wish of anybody in business, I believe. 

Q. Before the present law was enforced, did you petition for a license 
law ? Previous to two or three years ago, at the periods when there was any 
movement in the State for a license law, were you a petitioner for a license 
law? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How early ? 

A. I have always signed every petition that was brought to me. 

Q. Your opinion is, that if the State would throw its arms about the traf- 
fic, it would tend to make it more respectable, and aid the business ? 

A . I hardly know what you mean by aiding the business, unless it is upon 
the ground upon which you state. To aid it, in my view, is to raise it and 
put it upon a respectable foundation, so that everybody should be willing to 
engage in it. 

Q. What makes it low ? 

A. That there is no restraint upon it. 

Q. In what respect ? 

A. Because it is sold openly, and has been, by what we are in the 
habit of calling irresponsible people, who have no regard for any portion of 
their character in any way, and whose only desire is to make money out of it. 
You ask what would make it respectable. I should say, take it away from 
such people as that, and put it into the hands of people who would uphold a 
law that would sustain them in it. 

Q. But in the dry goods trade nobody asks restrictions for the sale of cot- 
ton cloth. What is there in the nature of your business that requires regu- 
lating more than the dry goods business, in your judgment ? 

A. Of course it is well know that a man can make a different use of a 
stimulant than he can of cotton. 

Q. Why not make the trade entirely open, and put restraint upon the 
drinker who makes a bad use of the liquor ? 

A. We do not believe, sir, that it is not so now. 

Q. Why not put it in that form ? 



APPENDIX. 635 

A. The trade have no particular objection to having it entirely open, but 
the fact that men engage in it, and are engaged in it, who make it derogatory 
somewhat. 

Q. Do you mean to say that drunkenness and other social evils, follow 
from the business as conducted at the hands of some men, and not as con- 
ducted at the hands of other men ? 

A. I believe, sir, that drunkenness does not follow from the hands of any 
man who sells liquor. I believe it follows from the feeling and the desire on 
the part of the drinker to get drunk. 

Q. Who drinks to get drunk, or who misjudges the amount that he can 
carry ? 

A. Well, sir, there is a certain state, when a man who has been drinking 
will desire to get drunk. 

Q. Why ask any restriction upon the traffic ? 

A. I said that the desire of the petitioners, so far as I know those who 
have petitioned, is for a law of regulation in the business. We do not believe 
in a law of prohibition, because we do not believe there can be any restraint 
put upon the business thereby. 

Q. Would you have any objection, if the State should prefer to throw open 
the traffic entirely, and direct its efforts to suppress the improper use of 
liquors, by the application of the law to drunkenness ? 

A. I think that would be a matter of experiment entirely. 

Q. As a trafficker, you would have no objection to that state of things, 
would you ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q, Precisely what ? 

A. Because I think there are certainly persons who should not be allowed 
to sell. 

Q. Does it make any difference who sells brandy, as to what effect it will 
produce ? 

A. It is according to the kind of brandy they sell,. 

Q. It depends much upon that, does it ? 

A. My opinion would be, that if a person was going to buy of the State 
Agent, it would. 

Q. Does the State Agent purchase of you ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you know the quality of the liquors kept by the State Agency ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How? 

A. By tasting. 

Q. Can you distinguish good liquor from bad by the taste ? 

A. I have been in the business twenty-five years. I know by the taste, if 
I know anything that I taste. 

Q. How do you know that the liquor you tasted came from the agency ? 

A. Because the gentleman who brought it to me so stated. 

Q. That is hearsay testimony. 

A. There is a good deal of that which is true. 

Q. Do you know that the liquors came from the State Agency ? 



636 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir ; just as well as I can know anything. 

Q. Do you positively know that they came from the agency ? 

A. I know in the way and manner which I obtained it, and that only. 

Q. Speaking of the effects of liquor at the hands of irresponsible persons, 
have you never seen the effects of liquor sold in first-class houses ? 

Q. (By Mr. Richards.) Will you please to describe what you mean by 
the effects ? 

A. Greater or less inebriety and disorder. Have you never known of a 
large degree of inebriety and even disorder in first-class houses ? 

Q. (By Mr. Richards.) Do you mean hotels ? 

A. I raise the question generally ; you may include, of course, hotels. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Public or private ? 

A. (By Mr. Miner.) Either or both. 

Q. (By Mr. Richards.) Have I not seen liquor as the reason for disor- 
ders on the premises where it is sold ? 

A. (By Mr. Miner.) That is a little more specific than my question ; but 
you may answer that. 

A. (By Mr. Richards.) I cannot say that I have. 

Q. Do you know that the effects of liquor in first-class houses have been 
inebriety and disorder ? 

A. I have often heard — not often heard, but I have read in the papers — of 
disturbances in places where liquor is sold. 

Q. Is that the most intimate knowledge you have ? 

A. I cannot know, according to your rule, when I say that I have not seen 
it myself. 

Q. Then you have never seen inebriety in these places ? 

A. Have I not just said that, sir ? 

Q. You said you had never seen the liquor drank. I ask you a little 
broader question. Have you never seen inebriety in first-class houses ? 

A. I suppose that you use the term inebriety as merely a polite phrase for 
drunkenness. I never have seen at " Parker's," or the " Tremont," or the 
" Revere," or any of our first-class hotels, any drunkenness. I am not con- 
stantly at these places, however. 

Q. Have you never seen gentlemen going out of these places partially 
inebriated. 

A. It is pretty difficult to answer that. I have seen persons coming out of 
the hotels in slippery weather, and have seen them fall down. I could not 
tell whether they were inebriated or not. 

Q. In the list of establishments embraced in the list here, have you never 
known circumstances where inebriety had been occasioned ? 

A. I do not know what the whole breadth of this license law may be. 

Q. I do not know all the details ; but in general I suppose you know that 
the apothecaries, and the grocers, and the like, are contemplated as proper to 
be licensed. And my question is, Are you not aware that, in the range 
of these, inebriety frequently arises from the use of liquors ? 

A. I do not know that I can say that. I think that where it is sold free 
and openly, as it is, and has been, that no honest man can stand up and say 
that a man does not enter his establishment who is inebriated ; at the same 



APPENDIX. 637 

time I would not admit that the man kept a bad house, because such a person 
came there, any more than I would if he should go into your church. 

Q. Have you a doubt that men buy and drink liquors and become inebri- 
ated in first-class houses in Boston ? Are you not aware that these things do 
occur ? And that the inebriety is from liquor purchased and drank in these 
houses ? 

A. No, sir. That is a very sweeping denunciation. If you ask me as to 
all these places, I should say that I believe, sir, as we all know, that the use 
of intoxicating liquors may make a man inebriated in his own house or any- 
where else. 

Q. Then the restriction you ask is not a restriction that will prevent 
inebriety in these houses ? 

A. I do not know how you can prevent a man from inebriety unless you 
have a higher power than any one of us have. 

Q. Then you do not contemplate a system that shall prevent drunkenness ? 

A. I think that we can have a law which will restrict it. 

Q. Do you believe, as a liquor-seller, that any license law that can be 
enacted will limit or reduce the amount of liquor business in Boston, not as 
to the number of places, but in its aggregate ? 

Q. (By Mr. Richards.) As to the quantity sold ? 

A. (By Mr. Miner.) Yes, sir. 

A. I do. 

Q. How in the quality ? 

A. In the first place, I believe that rn its present condition it is now drank 
in a hypocritical and deceitful manner. I believe that the traffic has been 
driven out of the daylight, and out of the sight of men into dark and danger- 
ous and lonesome places, where men have no respect for themselves while 
there, and have no control over themselves. I believe there is a spark of 
something in every man that when he has got to stand up daily and hourly or 
often enough to get inebriated at a public bar, he is ashamed if he go too far ; 
but if he is driven to obtain a bottle or a gallon in a surreptitious manner 
and carry it to his home, that then and there it will create an influence that 
he will not restrict himself. 

Q. Then you think that the carrying of liquor to a person's home has 
a bad effect ? 

A. I think it has with some. 

Q. Then would you think the plan of a license law unfavorable if it 
proposes to shut up all open places ? 

A. I believe that a man who can make a proper use of liquor will make 
use of it as well in one place as another. I believe there are some who 
cannot do that, who should be restrained. 

Q. Do you believe on the whole that any man's business is promoted when 
he is compelled to make it secret and clandestine. 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then how do you say that the license law would restrain the amount 
of sale ? 

A. I said the amount of use, or the amount of drinking. 

Q. I put the two things together. 



638 APPENDIX. 

A. Hardly in the instances that you suggest. 

Q. Why not? 

A. Because, if a man came to me to purchase liquor, who I knew would 
not make a proper use of it, I should not sell it to him. And although it maj 
seem rather strange to you, yet I can say that I never sold any liquor to anj 
man that I thought would make a bad use of it. But if I sell a barrel to a 
person, and he should sell out of it to irresponsible persons who peddle it ou* 
to others, I believe there is where restraint might step in. 

Q. Has it really been so hemmed in that it is necessary to peddle it out ? 

A. It is not so circumscribed ; but certain persons take that way of selling 
it. 

Q. You testified just now that you believed that a license law could be 
made so as to restrict the amount that should be sold and used. I understand 
you now to say that a restriction driving into it secret, tends to promote its sale. 

A. You ally these questions together. 

Q. They belong together. 

A. I said that the amount of liquor which would be sold, under a law of 
regulation, I think would be smaller than the amount now sold. 

Q. Precisely what do you mean by a law of regulation ? Do you mean 
anything more than a law protecting men in selling liquors as a beverage ? 

A . I mean that any evil (as you please to call it) can be under certain 
restraints. After you have acknowledged that it does exist and must exist, it 
can be put under certain restraints by means of laws of regulation, while a 
law of pure prohibition may not restrict the effect. 

Q. Do you mean the amount sold ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you, as a business man, here asking for a license law to restrict 
your business in amount ? 

Q. By Mr. Richards.) My own individual business ? 

A. (By Mr. Miner.) Yes sir. 

A. I could not say that. 

Q. You speak of shameful occurrences in various places. Do you suppose 
that the drinking of liquors as a beverage is, or by any legislation under 
heaven can be made, as respectable a business as selling meat ? 

A. Yes, sir. , 

Q. As a beverage ? k 

A. As a beverage. 

Q. Do you believe that the use of liquors is good for a man ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you rest on your own experience and observation ? 

Q. (By Mr. Richards.) Do you mean whether I have drank it myself 
or not ? 

A. (By Mr. Miner.) Yes, sir. 

A. In the first place I do not like your statement, and your jumping from 
one question to another, and passing very lightly over it. 

Q. In the present state of things 

A. In any state of things, I believe that any man with an honest con- 
science (and I profess to have one), sir, can do a liquor business and do it in 



APPENDIX. 639 

an honorable manner. If you will visit my store, I will show you names of 
men from almost all classes of society, from the judge, who to-day would sen- 
tence me, down to the juror in the box. These men come into my store, 
judges, physicians, and (I beg your pardon for saying it,) ministers 

Mr. Miner. You need not beg my pardon for saying it, for I do not go 
there. 

Mr. Richards. And (I beg your pardon [to Mr. Child] for saying it) 
lawyers ; and they buy of me the wines which I bring from foreign countries. 
I find that it takes some money to buy them, and that it takes some money to 
bring them here, and I find that this class of people come to me to buy my 
goods, and that physicians send to me for articles for their use 

Q. Do you keep an apothecary shop ? 

A. No, sir; although, in a certain sense of the term, we sell a good deal 
of medicine. 

Q. Are you able to go one step further, and to say that your business is 
cognate to that of selling meat ? 

A. Yes, sir ; anything that the public require. 

Q. Do you think the utility of a business depends upon whether the public 
require the article ? 

A. If they will have it, and always have had it since the world began. 

Q. Would you apply it to gaming ? 

A. If you regard it as a business, I would have it. 

Q. Would you recommend a friend, a man in health, a young man, to 
patronize such establishments in first class-houses, where parties drink liquors 
daily as a beverage ? 

A. Well, sir, I hardly see what bearing that question can have. If a 
young man should come to me to ask whether he had better commence that 
kind of life or that business, I should say no. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state that once more ? 

A. I said, sir, that if a young man (my brother, I think you said, or friend), 
should come to me and ask my advice whether he had better begin (speaking 
of him as an novice), I should say no. If he came to me and asked me if 
he had better take it as a medicine, I should say, that he could do so if he 
thought best. 

Q. You speak of the liquors of the State Agency being bad, and that you 
knew of whom the agent purchased ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Would you feel at liberty to tell ? 

A, No, sir. 

Q. But you point out the agency without scruple ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Why will you not state where the agent buys ? 

A . I believe that is a matter in which I have no concern. 

Q. Is the man of whom he buys a respectable dealer ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Is he not as respectable as any dealer in the city ? 



640 APPENDIX. 

A. I do not know of whom he buys all he sells. I know of whom he buys 
some, or who I have understood has supplied him ; that is, as you have 
instructed me to know. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Did I understand you to say that you had been in 
business a good many years in Boston ? 

A, I have. 

Q. And have you observed the course of trade in your particular class of 
business ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I would like to ask your opinion in regard to the change, if there has 
been any, in the quality of liquors that have been sold, for the last few years, 
in Boston ? 

A. I think the quality, sir, has deteriorated very materially. 

Q. I do not refer to your own business, of course, but to the general 
business of Boston. What explanation do you give for that ? 

A. In the first place, I should say, that the great increase in prices, occa- 
sioned by the high tariff and large internal revenue taxes, has produced 
a modification in its production which has deteriorated its quality. Some five 
or eight years ago, a person could buy a gallon of very decent whiskey for 
fifty cents ; now that same article ought to cost him a dollar and a half. 
And there have all kinds of modifications of that article been introduced and 
sold. 

Q. What is the effect of the surreptitious sale upon the quality of the 
article sold ? 

A. I think the class of people to whom I referred then, care nothing for 
the quality at all. They want that kind of liquor which will only make the 
" drunk " come. It makes but little difference, so long as there is an alcoholic 
stimulant, what the different component parts are. They know they are selling 
unlawfully, and that they have the House of Correction hanging over them ; 
and they think that as long as they cannot have a more open field, they will 
have a larger chance of profit from what they do sell. It is in the same way, 
if I may illustrate, as the illicit distillation is carried on. Therefore, these 
men engage in it ; and the Lord only knows what the quality of the liquor is 
which they sell. 

Q. Suppose that this liquor law were generally enforced in Boston, so that 
only the hotels and grocers and the wholesale dealers, and those persons con- 
sidered respectable, should sell liquor, would the actual sale of liquor cease ? 
And how would it be as to the change in the amount and the quality of what 
was sold ? 

A. Regarding the amount that might be sold, of course it is regulated, as 
my friend the Doctor says, by the amount drank. I do not believe restricting 
the sale in any way affects, to any very great amount, the use among men 
who will have it at any rate. In our neighborhood there is nothing easier 
(and it is done every day) than for some man to send to New York and obtain 
all he wants. My experience has been, all my life, that if a man wanted it 
he would have it. There seemed to be something that would lead him to 
make any sacrifice, and he would have it upon any consideration whatever ; 
and I believe that if you close to-day the places you have designated, the 



APPENDIX. 641 

business would still find its war, and that men would dare, assuming all the 
chances of profit, to take up the business, and run all the risks of its pains 
and penalties, and carry it on at any rate. I do not believe it among the 
things possible to entirely restrain its sale. 

Q. What change, if any, do you think there would be in its quality ? 

A. I believe that, if there is a class of men to-day who are uneasy regard- 
ing this inquiry, it is among certain portions of the liquor-dealers who know 
that they cannot obtain a license. I believe that they are aware that by no 
means could they obtain a license. A license system, as has been remarked, 
contemplates putting the sale into the hands of respectable men in trade, and 
these men are determined to conduct the business upon as high a platform as 
it is possible to put it. During some ten years it was always the custom of 
first-class dealers not to sell to anybody who had not a license, because they 
were liable to be broken up. Therefore, it becomes a matter of self-interest 
not to trust those men nor to deal with them. If I come up here, or to the 
Mayor and Aldermen of the city, to obtain a license, and find that I must 
enter into certain bonds, and that I must agree to all sorts of stipulations, 
which will restrain the business, and then that I must pay a certain amount 
for the privilege of carrying on that business, it then becomes a matter of 
self-interest that I should not allow any one to open an establishment near me 
and go on without a license. I then become one of the police myself, and I 
become among the first to inform against him ; thus I think we should incline 
to unite with the men in the legitimate business in the suppression of the 
improper sale, and that great good would result in that way. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you not think it would be a very useful thing 
if some system of general inspection of liquors could be pursued, with a view 
of protecting persons against poisonous liquors fraudulently sold them ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. What is your opinion of the-character and quality of a large propor- 
tion of the liquors now sold ? 

A . I believe, sir, it is very bad, indeed. I think it was never worse, and 
not possible to make it worse. 

Q. Then in respect to the private and illicit distillation, are you able to 
form an opinion whether it has a tendency now to increase or not ? 

A. As a general principle, I should say that it has. I have always 
believed that the higher the tax was the greater the temptation was for men 
to distill illicitly. I know it is offered every day at a very cheap rate. The 
tax on a gallon of whiskey is $2.00 ; but there is a plenty of what is called 
whiskey which is sold for $1.25 or $1.50. That is the kind these people buy 
and sell. 

Q. And that is largely sold, is it not, under cover, and beyond the reach 
of even common ordinary inspection ? 

A, Yes, sir; so that, to my certain knowledge (in the manner that I used 
the expression some while since), it is peddled about the city. An Irish 
woman can buy a gallon and take it to her room or any place that she sees 
fit, and then she can receive her guests, and the first thing we know is that 
somebody comes out of there inebriated. You may go into that house, and 
you will find no proof of the sale of liquor there. You cannot find a tumbler 
81 



642 APPENDIX. 

or a pitcher, though you may find a bowl perhaps. Now, that article that 
they have been drinking, is, in my opinion, injurious. It causes delirium of 
the brain, and it encourages all the pugnacious qualities of these people. 

Q. More maddening than ordinary liquor ? 

A. Of course. 

Q. Now supposing we carry the supposition one step farther. Supposing 
that the sale of pure liquors and good wines was driven off from the sur- 
face, so that it was no longer feasible to obtain it, and no respectable person 
sold it at all in any form, from what you know and have learned during your 
experience and observation for years, have you any doubt that private and 
domestic distillation would take the place of the present modes of production, 
and that a private illicit and contraband sale would supply the wants of all 
these people ? 

A. I have no doubt in the world of it, sir. I believe, as I have said before, 
that where human appetite claims it, human ingenuity will produce it, and 
will have it. 

Q. And the same use would be a thousand times more beyond the reach 
and control of authority, whether by its legal or moral influence, than it 
now is ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) What facilities would you as license men have for 
suppressing the business of that Irish woman that the State does not have 
now? 

A. We do not propose to take the sale into our own hands as license men, 
but we propose to carry on our business. 

Q. Do you believe that you can suppress the unlicensed trafficker when the 
police cannot ? 

A. I mean that I can aid the police in that matter. 

Q. Then you would in that matter render aid under a license system 
where you would not lend it now ? 

A. I do propose to turn myself, sir, yet, into a State Constable. 

Q. But if you were licensed, you would render aid to the police author- 
ities ? 

A. I stated that it would be for my interest to do so. 

Q. That is, when your interest required it you would do so ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In regard to the quality of liquors, would there be any facility or any 
means of testing liquors which would operate better for suppressing the traffic, 
turning on the quality of liquors, than there would be under the existing law, 
in seizing the whole stock ? 

A. If I understand the nature of your question. 

Q. v My question is simply this. You spoke of the inspection of liquor, 
did you not ? 

A. I did. 

Q. My question is what possible advantage there is in the inspection, offi- 
cially, of liquor, for the furthering of the interests of the community in that 
regard, that is not involved in the present law ? 



APPENDIX. 643 

A. I have doubt that if you seize all that a man has got, you can find out 
what it is very easily. I thought your question referred to the quality of 
liquor. 

Q. I refer to the question of removing from the community the very bad 
liquors. We would remove them by seizure. Is your method better than the 
present ? 

A. I think it would be. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Did you obtain a license from the United 
States ? 

A. I did. ■ 

Q. Have you one now ? 

A. I have. 

Q. Have you ever taken pains to prosecute, or obtain the prosecution of 
unlicensed persons ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q, Then if you do not take pains to prosecute, having a United States 
license, why would you do so any more under a State license ? 

A. Because it has been judicially decided that the United States license 
does not protect me. 

Q. Did you before that decision ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then would your State license induce you to do it any more ? 

A. The United States license is entirely general in its terms. It places 
me under no restriction. It offers me no law of regulation at all. It is sim- 
ply presented to me by the officer of' the revenue, as something which we 
I must do, and which I know nothing about. The State license offers me 
something which protects me in my business ; and if I see a party near me 
who has no right to pursue the business, I 'should proceed against him. 

Q. Does that give you the right to deal in these articles which the 
United States license would not ? 

A. The National Government gives us no right; it only taxes us. 

Q. I have heard your statement. I want to ask you one question more. 
You may answer my question or not, just as you please. You know that 
it is a violation of the laws of Massachusetts to sell intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I know there is a law to that effect. 

Q. I will ask you (and you need not answer the question unless you 
choose), how you can as a citizen of the Commonwealth, justify any one. in 
knowingly and daily violating a law of the Commonwealth which protects 
you and all your rights ? 

Q. (By Mr. Kichards.) How can I justify myself ? 

A. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Yes, sir. 

A. That is something which we have been looking for, and are looking 
for now in a change of the law. 

Q. Taking the law as an existing law of the Commonwealth of which you 
are a citizen, how can you as a good citizen justify any man in daily violating 
a known law of the Commonwealth of which he is a citizen ? 



644 APPENDIX. 

A. Well, sir, I am only one in the matter. I justify myself in the same 
way that a thousand good and respectable and intelligent men in this com- 
munity justify themselves in coming in and asking me to break it. 

Q. That is your rule ? 

A. I have no rule. 

Q. Have you no other reason to give ? 

A. I have no particular reason. 

Testimony of William H. Fox. 
Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You reside in Taunton ? 
A. I do. 

Q. You are judge of what court ? 

A. I am judge of the Municipal Court in Taunton. 

Q. You know the question here between a prohibitory or license law. I 
should like your judgment in regard to it. 

A . I do not know much of the working of the old license law, as it was 
repealed before I knew much about it. As to the working of the prohibitory 
law in Taunton, I should think that two years ago there was as much liquor 
sold in Taunton as ever there was. It appeared to be very much restricted. 
Places were very numerous where liquor could be had. Up to that time we 
had existed as a town government, the city charter being given January 1st, 
1866 ; and there were no police on duty and no officers to prosecute liquor- 
sellers : so that the prosecutions made before the granting of the city charter 
were mainly made by prominent temperance people, who at times, by con- 
certed action, sent a batch of complaints to the jury, and had several of the 
dealers arrested and tried and sometimes convicted. These efforts on the 
part of the temperance men were intermittent, and proved ineffectual, 
although sometimes shops were closed by their efforts. But more were opened 
than were closed. In 1866, under the city government, we had a board of 
government friendly to the temperance cause. The City Marshal and 
assistant tried, I think, to enforce the law as well as they could. They first 
ordered the sellers to close their shops at ten o'clock every night, and to keep 
closed on the Sabbath. This law was obeyed after several prosecutions. 
The liquor-dealers had no objections, as long as it worked universally. That 
stopped drinking carousal in the street. Some efforts were made to suppress 
the sale further .than that; and quite a number of prosecutions were made by 
the city marshal. But during that year, the United States license question 
was before the Supreme Court, and the liquor-dealers seemed to think that as 
long as this question was open they were safe. So that during the year I do 
not think much was accomplished in stopping the sale of liquor, except in the 
night-time and on the Sabbath, as I have already stated. 

Q. This was in 1865 that you have been speaking of? 

A. Yes, sir, 1865; I said 1866. This month, I think, the first seizure by 
the State Constabulary was made in Taunton. The stock of the three largest 
dealers were successfully seized, amounting in all to five or six thousand dollars 
in value. One of these dealers whose liquors were seized had been up to that 
time the leading liquor-seller. I should call him the representative liquor- 
seller, except that he was the most respectable of the dealers. He was a man 



APPENDIX. 645 

whom temperance men often approached for the purpose of arguing with him 
on the question. A great deal of moral suasion had been used and wasted on 
him. Prosecutions had been made and a great deal of money had been made, 
but nothing had been done in any way to stop his selling liquor. But his 
liquors were seized ; and from that time to this he has not sold a drop of 
liquor. His establishment is turned into a respectable clothing establishment, 
and rented to parties in Boston, who have rented it for a term of years. One 
other is also stopped. So that of the three whose liquors were seized, two 
have stopped. That was the first blow to the liquor-dealers in Taunton, of 
any importance. It frightened them more than anything else that I have 
ever known. The traffic has been unsettled since then. And I have heard 
that, when the State Constable has been expected, large quantities of liquors 
have been removed to some place where they could be kept out of sight. I 

think that the stopping of this place of Mr. was one of the best things 

that the State Constabulary could have done. I think that single suppression 
would pay all the expenses of the Constabulary in the town of Taunton since 
they have been established. He was the largest rumseller, and the smaller 
sellers have referred to him, and said that he was making money out of the 
business, and asked why his place was not stopped. I think it has had a 
remarkable influence. In July of last year, a State Constable was appointed 
for Taunton. He immediately commenced a vigorous execution of the law ; 
and while he was in office (until the first of January of this year), I think the 
results of his efforts were very marked and decided. A few years ago, in 
" Rum Hollow," as it was called, stores and liquor shops were open on both 
sides of the street at any time, and people passing by could get their jugs and 
demijohns filled, and the sale was very exposed, and the odor of liquor was 
very perceptible in the street. To-day there is not one shop where it is kept 
that I know of; there may be one place where it is kept. What I have said 
of " Rum Hollow " is substantially true of the city. I do not think that there 
are one-third as many places open now as there were a year ago. 

Q. And none of them public ? 

A. Very few of them, I think, that are open. There are two or three 
that I should call open shops. They usually keep a Avatch, I think, at the 
windows, and look out for suspicious persons like the State Constables. 

Q. Do you feel that it has diminished the sale of liquors there a good 
deal? 

A. I do, sir. I think that not only the sale but the use of liquor has 
decreased. It is a fact well known and frequently spoken of that less liquor 
if ilrank now than a year ago. 

Q. You attribute to the fact of the law being carried out by the State 
Police ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Testimony of Rev. Andrew Pollard. 
Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Of what denomination are you a clergyman ? 
A. Baptist. 

Q. You reside in Taunton ? 
A. I do. 



646 APPENDIX. 

Q. You have heard the testimony of Judge Fox — does your observation 
agree with his ? 

A. It does very generally and very decidedly. 

Q. Have you been in the habit of looking into this matter of intemper- 
ance ? 

A. I have, sir. The cause is one that I have been much interested in for 
many years, and I have watched things very closely. 

Q. You are very strongly in favor of a prohibitory law. 

A. I am. 

Q. And of the State Constabulary ? 

A. Yes, sir. I think there are reasons very important and very conclusive, 
why I should favor the present law and the efforts of the State Constabulary 
to enforce that law. 

Q. Will you please give them briefly ? 

A. In the first place, I believe that the prohibitory law is right in princi- 
ple, and that the license law would be essentially wrong in principle, and I 
have observed that whatever is wrong in principle never works well practi- 
cally. 

Q. You believe with Governor Andrew that it is safe to stick to good 
principles ? 

A . I do most decidedly. I also believe that the prohibitory law, if properly 
enforced by the State Constabulary, would very largely suppress the sale and 
use of spirituous liquors. I have no faith in any other means. I have some 
remembrance of the old license law, and some knowledge of license laws in 
other States. I have no faith in the efficiency of such laws to suppress the 
illicit sale of spirituous liquors. 

Q. How long have you lived in Taunton ? 

A. Nearly eighteen years. 

Q. Have you any information in regard to the license laws in Rhode 
Island ? 

A. I have some. 

Q. Has it done anything to suppress the sale of liquor there ? Does not 
everybody sell in Rhode Island that desires to ? What is your opinion, derived 
from any facts that you may have learned ? 

A. My opinion is that the license law of Rhode Island has been as widely 
violated by the illicit sale of liquor, as the Massachusetts prohibitory law, in 
proportion to the population. I believe that it is generally considered that 
it has been almost universally violated by those who have sold. 

Q. All that you have read, or observed, or reflected upon it has led you to 
suppose that such is the general effect of license laws ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that they have never been efficient in restraining the traffic ? 

A. I have some means of knowing the public sentiment somewhat upon 
this subject, and one reason that influences me very decidedly in favor of a 
prohibitory law is that, according to my best knowledge and judgment, 
the most disinterested and impartial judges favor prohibitory legisla- 
tion, and condemn a license law ; and that to a very large extent, 
the ooen and earnest advocates of a license law are interested parties, parties 



APPENDIX. 617 

biased either by interest or by appetite ; and I have always observed that the 
testimony of one biased strongly either by appetite or by interest, though it 
may be given with perfect honesty, is to be received with great caution. And 
parties who are disinterested, men who do not wish to drink or to sell, are very 
generally, according to my observation, opposed to a license law and in favor 
of prohibition. 

Q. Is there anything more that you would like to state — anything that 
you deem important ? 

A. As one who feels a great deal of interest in young men, I deprecate 
very much the giving of the legal sanction of the Commonwealth to the sale 
of spirituous liquors. Young men begin to drink in the most respectable 
places where liquor is sold. Very generally they will not go into the hidden 
and degrading places, if they have not already learned to drink in places 
more respectable. If I had no other interest in this measure, I should deplore 
the consequences of giving the sanction of the Commonwealth to the sale of 
spirituous liquors, even to the most respectable men who are engaged in such 
a business. I fear that such a policy would be hostile to good morals, unsafe 
to our young men, and in many instances very destructive. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You made some remark just now about the opin- 
ions of gentlemen who express their judgment against the present law as 
being properly subject to a certain deduction as to their value, because such 
people are usually influenced either by their appetite for drink, or by their 
pecuniary interest as dealers ? 

A. My statement was that the open and most earnest advocates of a 
license law are very generally those who are either biased by their interest 
or appetite. 

Q. Do you profess to be acquainted with the twenty thousand men 
who have petitioned for this law ? 

A. Not with all of them, but I know a sample of them. 

Q. Do you apply the remark you have just now made, to the gentlemen 
who have testified before this Committee, — to such gentlemen as the Rev. Dr. 
Bacon, Eev. Dr. Todd, Rev. Dr. Blakely, Rev. Dr. Neale, Bishop Eastburn, 
and a large class of other gentlemen, who have testified and expressed their 
opinion in favor of the license law. Do you desire your remark to be applied 
to those gentlemen ? 

A. I do not make any such application of it. 

Q. Then what value do you wish the Committee to attach to the remark 
as a part of your testimony ? You understand that the Committee are sitting 
here to estimate and consider and weigh, the opinions and facts they receive 
in evidence before them, according to their value. Now, if you make that 
remark at all, do you not either make it with the intent that it shall be applied 
to those gentlemen who have testified, or else do you make it as something of 
no value at all and simply as a fling ? 

A . I disclaim entirely any intent of making it as a fling. I made it as my 
deep conviction. I applied the remark to the open advocates of a license law, 
not to the witnesses. I suppose that the witnesses were ordered to appear 
here and give their testimony, and, therefore, I do not regard them as advo- 
cates ; but I know that in the community in which I live, the men who are 



648 APPENDIX. 

interested, are all in favor of a license law. I do not know any exceptions 
whatsoever. This is true in Fall River, in New Bedford, and in Boston, so 
far as I am acquainted. 

Q. Then you exclude the gentlemen who testified in favor of the petition 
before the Committee from the application of that remark ? 

A. I do not apply it to them nor exclude them from it. 

Q. Do you intend that it shall be understood as applying to them ? 

A. I did not make any such application of it. 

Q. Then I ask with what intent, and for what purpose was it made, if it 
was not made with the view of affecting the value of the testimony of those 
gentlemen ? 

A. I have no objection to saying that I made the remark simply upon 
account of its bearing upon the direct question here at issue. It is a fact that 
I have observed so widely that it seems to me to be important. 

Q. Have you any idea of the actual, legitimate use of spirituous liquors 
and wines in such a commonwealth as Massachusetts, and of the number of 
persons to whom this remark of yours must necessarily apply, if it applies 
outside of the range of witnesses ? 

A. I am aware that the application is very broad. 

Q. Do you not know that spirituous liquors, and whiskey in particular, 
have for the last five and twenty years been applied very generally for medi- 
cinal purposes in cases of tubercular disease of the lungs ? 

A . I know that it has been applied to a very great extent, but how widely 
I cannot say. 

Q. Do you not know that it is regarded in the medical profession, as in fact 
a specific against tubercular disease ? 

A. I was not aware that it was regarded as a specific. 

Q. Did you ever read the report of Dr. Swett, of New York, of the 
examination of the bodies of seventy men who were brought into the public 
dead-house of New York City, who were what are known as " gutter drunk- 
ards," none of whom had tubercular disease of the lungs? 

A. I never heard of that. 

Q. Are you not aware that that is but one of several facts and circum- 
stances that tend to prove that it is a specific remedy for incipient tubercular 
disease ? 

A. No, sir ; not that it is a specific. I know that some physicians prescribe 
it and that some do not. 

Q. Do you not know that throughout the medical profession, it is almost 
universally prescribed ? 

A. I am not able to say. 

Q. Are you not aware that the statistics of mortality show that about one- 
fifth part of all the people who die in Massachusetts, and, I think, in New 
England also, die of tubercular disease of the lungs ? 

A . I am aware that a very large proportion of them do. 

Q. Then that shows, does it not, that as a matter of medical treatment, 
about one-fifth part of the whole population of Massachusetts, either must, or 
properly may, use whiskey daily ? 

A. I do not think that follows at all. 



APPENDIX. 649 

Q. Must or may, I said, under competent medical advice ? 

A. I do not know as I could admit that as a fact. I do not know what is 
the proportion. 

Q Supposing that to be the proportion, does not that show that at least 
one person in every family in Massachusetts upon an average, some time or 
other during the course of the year, either must or may very properly and 
under competent medical advice of the highest character, use some such 
article as a matter of daily use ? 

A. I have no doubt, sir, that it is used and may be used somewhat exten- 
sively for medicinal purposes. 

Q. And taken daily, as some of the witnesses have testified here, for 
months or years together by a man who is able to pursue his usual daily 
profession or calling ? 

A. I am not aware of such testimony, or of such a use under medical 
advice. 

Q. Then, are you not willing, in view of your ignorance of facts which 
are known to exist and have been testified to by gentlemen before the Com- 
mittee, to be somewhat charitable in your consideration of the motives of 
men who take upon themselves the responsibility, before a grave tribunal, 
of expressing their views in respect to a matter of such deep concern ? 

A . Certainly, I took that fully into consideration before I made the remark, 
and see no reason now why I should qualify it. 

Q. But then you do not apply the remark to those who have testified ? 

A. I would apply the remark to a witness who testified an hour ago and 
affirmed his interest in the liquor business, and declared that that interest 
would lead him to give information that would result in the prosecution of 
illicit dealers. 

Q. Is there any occasion for you, as a minister of the Gospel, to come up 
here and make any such a remark as that in reference to Mr. Richards, who 
came here involuntarily, at the summons of these Remonstrants, to answer the 
questions that were put to him politely, and without aspersing anybody ? 

A. I think that on a great question like this the whole truth should be 
spoken. That was my only aim. I was aware of the odium that might be 
attached to the expression of such a conviction, nevertheless I expressed it 
and I abide by it. 

Q. Are you not aware that the disciples, eighteen hundred years ago, 
undertook to make just such remarks about other people who did not choose to 
cast out devils in their way, and do you remember the rebuke of the Master 
of us all ? 

A. If this devil can be cast out at all — the devil of drunkenness and liquor- 
selling — I will fellowship any man that can do the work. 

Q. Do you appear here as a witness and attempt to prejudge that concern- 
ing which there may be an honest difference of opinion, by an uncharitable 
remark of that description, when the Committee are in pursuit of the truth ? 

A. I do not deem the remark at all uncharitable. I remarked that the 
prominent advocates of a license law were, to the extent of my knowledge, 
biased by interest or appetite. I fail to see anything uncharitable in the 
remark. 



650 APPENDIX. 

Q. Supposing that were true, what right has this Committee to be affected 
by that fact in the judgment that they shall be led to form ? Is not the Legis- 
lature and the Committee bound to find out the truth and declare it if they 
can, irrespective of the motives which influence anybody ; and can any tribu- 
nal, short of the Infinite tribunal to which you and I have got to answer at 
last, assume properly to judge of motive ? 

A. I believe it is recognized as a principle in law in regard to evidence 
that, where a witness's appetite or interest bias him, that fact is to be taken 
into account by the jury. 

Q. Have we put any witnesses of that character upon the stand ? 

A. I do not know, sir. 

Q. Then where was the propriety of your remark, taking this view as just 
now laid down ? 

A. I did not regard witnesses as advocates ; therefore, my remark did not 
intend to apply to them. I have no doubt, however, that it will apply to 
some who have testified ; very likely to others. One individual who has been 
upon the stand here, told me months ago that he was in the daily use of spir- 
ituous liquors. He was a clergyman, I regret to say. 

Q. Therefore, you think it proper to asperse the motives with which that 
gentleman testified ? 

A. Not at all, sir. 

Q. But still you adhere to your remark ? 

A. I do, but not to asperse his motives. His motives may be good ; but 
interest biases men, notwithstanding their statements may be made conscien- 
tiously, and in all sincerity. I believe that every lawyer understands that 
principle, and uses it in court very freely. 

Q. I am very sorry to have the bar, so far as I am acquainted with it, 
judged by the remark you have just made and adhered to. I have never been 
educated in any such a bar myself. You have alluded to the necessity of 
exercising a good influence over young men, and, therefore, you think it 
important that the Commonwealth should prevent, if possible, liquors and 
wines from being sold within the State, lest they might pervert the young — is 
that true ? 

A. That is one of my objections to a license law, that it proposes to license 
the most respectable class of liquor-dealers. Their houses would probably 
be attractive places to the young. I greatly fear that their influence would 
be to demoralize young men. The young begin to drink there ; they form 
the habit of drinking in respectable places. 

Q. Do you understand that the object or intent of the law is to license 
drinking-places as such ? 

A. I do not know definitely what is desired. I only speak from the sug- 
gestions that I have heard made. 

Q. The apprehension then that you feel is confined to that class of 
places ? 

A. No, sir. It attaches to the sale of spirituous liquors, either to be used 
on the place, or to be carried home. 

Q. Then you object to liquors being sold there to be drank upon the 
premises, or to be carried home ? 



APPENDIX. 651 

A. I object to the sale unless it be done by the agent under the direction 
and for the purposes provided by law. 

Q. Do you consider that the agent is or is not a respectable man V 

A. The agents of this State ? 

Q. Do you consider that licensing an agent takes him out of the category 
of respectable men ; and if not, does not your objection to licensing a respec- 
table man apply with equal force to the agent ? 

A . I think not. A sale, sanctioned by law, of spirituous liquors to be used 
medicinally, or in the arts, is entirely respectable, if such sale be necessary ; 
and it is my conviction that it may be necessary. 

Q. You would have a law undertake to supervise the use made by citizens 
of a cDDRinercial article? 

A. I have made no such statement. 

Q. But does not your statement mean that, if it means anything ? 

A. I think it applies exclusively to the selling and drinking of liquor. 

Q. If it applies exclusively to the selling and drinking, is not the sale itself 
an injurious and an immoral one as soon as the sale is effected ? 

A . Do you mean the sale to be used as a beverage ? 

Q. The use is not a part of the sale ; the use is subsequent to the 
purchase. 

A. I think the sale of spirituous liquors to be used as a beverage in this 
Commonwealth, is a crime and a wrong. 

Q. I have no occasion or disposition to quarrel with your private con- 
science, or to interfere with your own affairs by the light of your conscience, 
but I am endeavoring to hold your mind to a contemplation of your own 
proposition, that the effect of a sale of spirituous liquors upon the young men. 
is injurious because of the temptation and influence. I now call your atten- 
tion to the fact that the agents of the Commonwealth sell spirituous liquors 
which young men may see sold or they may purchase. 

A . My point is, that as one who feels some interest in the preservation of 
the morals of young men and the welfare of the young generally, beginning 
with the principle, in which I firmly believe, that the use of spirituous liquors 
is injurious as a general rule, and indeed, in my opinion, in all cases excepting 
when used as a medicine, — my point is that it is injurious, and the danger of 
forming habits of intemperance is very great ; that, if the liquor traffic of the 
Commonwealth is branded as something wrong and improper and injurious? 
so that it is thereby driven into dark places, as theft and gambling are driven 
into dark places, where they ought to be if they exist at all, young men will 
not be half so likely to come into the low groggeries to learn to drink spirit- 
uous liquors and acquire habits of intemperance, as if liquor was sold in more 
respectable places and under the sanction of the law. In a licensed hotel, I 
can go in and buy brandy and wine with my dinner. I can go into a licensed 
store and buy a bottle of brandy and carry it to my room. It is lawful to do 
it. I fear that if such facilities are offered for the purchase of liquor in such 
respectable places, the result will be the ruin of many young men, while if 
these sales were not made honorable and given the sanction of the law, they 
would be saved. 



652 APPENDIX. 

A. Then it is not the facility with which liquor is obtained that influences 
your judgment, but it is the desire to procnre the stamping of moral condem- 
nation by the law upon the sale ? 

A. Not entirely that. 

Q. Which is it? 

A. It is both. 

Q. You want both ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In the first place to make it inconvenient for people to get liquor. 
That is one thing you want to do by the law ? 

A. Not merely inconvenient, but to make the getting of it disgraceful. 

Q. You want a law to make it inconvenient for people to get what by law 
they have the right to get ? 

A. No, sir, I do not admit that as my proposition. I want it to be per- 
fectly convenient to get what they need and are allowed to use for the 
purposes specified in the present law. 

Q. That is arguing in a circle. The question is now what the law ought 
to be. You want in the first place, if 1 understand you, to have the law 
render it inconvenient for people to get spirituous liquors. That is one thing 
you want to do for the protection of the young, is it not ? 

A. I do not want the sale of liquor to be made respectable and attractive 
to the young. 

Q. Do you or do you not take the ground that you want to render it 
inconvenient ? 

A. Certainly, when it is to be used as a beverage. I would also render it 
unattractive and repulsive. 

Q. Do you mean that you want to make it inconvenient and disgraceful, 
or disgraceful without being inconvenient ? 

A. I should like to have it so that if I had sons in danger, the law would 
so regulate the matter that it would be inconvenient for them to purchase (it 
is always best to have the temptation inconvenient), and not be led into it. 
Then I would have the sale odious. I want my sons and young friends to feel 
that they are lowering themselves by buying spirituous liquors. I think it is 
something that injures them. 

Q. Then you desire the law to take the morals and the education of young 
men, in respect to morality, into its custody, do you not ? 

A. To some extent. I do, so far as it is proper, but not exclusively. 

Q. Are you aware of anybody in the Commonwealth that teaches that 
doctrine ? 

A. I do myself, and I supposed that it was commonly taught. 

Testimony of Rev. John W. Willett. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You have heard the testimony of the gentlemen 
from Taunton ; do your observations correspond with theirs as to the influ- 
ence of the prohibitory law and of the State Constabulary ? 

A. Yes, sir ; so far as my observations extend. I have only been there 
for one year, but during that year, I am quite sure the effect has been as 
stated by them. 



APPENDIX. 653 

Q. Have you ever lived in Rhode Island ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Where? 

A. At Woonsocket. 

Q. Have they a license law there ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. How did the license law operate in Woonsocket, so far as you 
observed ? 

A. I never heard of but one effect of it ; that was to put so many dollars 
into the town treasury ? 

Q. Did it ever do anything to restrict the traffic ? 

A. !Not in the least. 

Q. Did other than licensed parties sell liquor ? 

A. Yes, sir. I cannot vouch for the statement, but it was commonly 
reported in Woonsocket, that there were thirty-three places licensed, and 
between fifty and sixty places that were not licensed ? 

Q. Do you presume that was something near the number ? 

A. I think there must be about that number, as I knew of a great many 
places. 

Q. What is the population of Woonsocket ? 

A. The village embraces a part of two towns ; the population is probably 
from seven to eight thousand. 

Q. That makes, then, nearly one hundred dealers in a population of 
seven or eight thousand ? 

A. About eighty or ninety. 

Q. There is an effort now being made to get a more stringent license law ? 

A. I have been so informed. 

Q. The present one does not seem to be satisfactory ? 

A. The people think of increasing its stringency. I was in the office of 
the United States Assessor in Providence a little while ago, with a friend, and 
he handed us a list of persons licensed, under the United States law, to sell 
liquor in that city. It enlbraced over four hundred names. I asked him if 
those were the names of all the liquor-sellers in Providence, and he said that 
it was not all ; he was satisfied that it was not quite half the number. I 
asked him how many of those who were not licensed by the United States, 
had a State or town license. He replied that he had called for a fee from 
every man who had a State or a town license, so that the United States 
license list, covered, so far as he knew, the list licensed by the State and city, 
so that according to his statement there were more unlicensed than licensed 
liquor-shops in Providence. 

Q. The general feeling, I suppose, was that the license law had no effect ? 

A. That was the feeling in Woonsocket, especially. I may say further, 

upon this point, that for the past thirty years, I have been actively engaged 

in promoting the temperance cause, and have taken all the pains that I could 

to ascertain all the facts bearing upon the subject. 

Q. Can you give us statistics ? 

A. I have no definite statistics with me. I made earnest inquiries in 
Woonsocket, and learned that at no time, when a license law was the law of 



654 APPENDIX. 

the State, had the rumsellers ever taken any pains to prosecnte the violators 
of that law. I learned of one case, where a few men who had been advo- 
cates of the license law, but were not themselves dealers, had succeeded in 
getting a sma 1 ! amount of funds from a few liquor-sellers for the purpose of 
prosecuting the law. That was all that they could do. Under the present 
law they had not been able to procure a single dollar to assist in shutting up 
the unlicensed shops. I was intimately acquainted with men who were most 
anxious to suppress the traffic, and also quite well acquainted with some of 
the dealers. One of the dealers who had a license, said that he considered it 
a contemptible piece of business for him, selling liquor as he was, to interfere 
with anybody else engaged in the same traffic. 

I can say, without hesitation, that in Woonsocket, I saw more drunken men 
in passing about the streets, in a month, than I have seen in Taunton in a 
year, and Taunton is a place of about twice the size of Woonsocket. There 
was no month that I was there, in which I did not see more drunken persons 
in the streets, than I have seen in Taunton during the twelve months that I 
have lived there. 

I have been acquainted with the temperance people, — with nearly all the 
active temperance men in south-eastern Massachusetts, in Plymouth and in 
Barnstable Counties, and I have not met the first man, who was in former 
years in favor of prohibition, who took any active part whatever in promoting 
the temperance cause, who now thinks it best to have a license law. This 
morning I heard of one man, whom I never knew, who said that he was for a 
license law. On the other hand, not long after the enactment of a prohibi- 
tory law, I was in a Division of the Sons of Temperance upon one occasion, 
and was called upon to make some remarks " for the good of the Order," and 
in my remarks I approved heartily of the prohibitory law,, and a gentlemen 
offered a very earnest opposition to what I had to say, and I was^ for the time 
being, almost tabooed in that room because of my view of the case. Those 
very same men, since that time, have taken the other side of the question. I 
think that I can count up at least ten men, who have changed in favor of pro- 
hibition, to every one that I have heard of as going the other way. 

Much testimony, it will not be denied, has been presented to show that 
there has been quite an increase of intemperance in the community. I have 
noticed a statement made by a correspondent of the " Woonsocket Patriot," 
which I think worthy of consideration. 

The correspondent himself was in favor of a license law. His statement 
was that intemperance was more rapidly increasing among the better-educated 
and better-conditioned class of society, among those who occupy good social 
positions, than among the low and degraded class. I think that his statement 
is correct. I think that the increase of intemperance, at the present day, is 
almost entirely among the better class of people ; among the better off, the 
better educated class ; among persons who have more refinement of manner, 
and higher social position. The complaint is made that intemperance has 
increased under the prohibitory liquor law. My observation is that there has 
been a very great neglect in the matter of educating the children upon this 
subject. I do not think there has been any great abatement of the effort to 
affect mature minds, but there has been an abatement of effort to affect the 



APPENDIX. 655 

minds of the children. We have, growing up around us, a class of young 
people who have never been well taught in this principle. I also account for 
the increase of drunkenness upon this ground: that so many in high author- 
ity and good social position, have scouted the idea of a prohibitory law, and 
have publicly set the example of using liquors, and have said that, in their 
opinion, total abstinence was a foolish thing, and the young people have fol- 
lowed their example. The increase in drunkenness has been in the large 
towns. This has been considered as quite an argument against the prohib- 
itory law. I think that in some cases it is an argument in favor of the law. 
In the large towns the law has been more defied. Young men on a bender, 
and old men on a spree, have gone to the cities, as they are not able to 
accommodate themselves at home. So that those gentlemen who testify in 
regard to the increase of intemperance in the larger places, testify only 
according to their own observation in those places. I think that they have 
not scanned the whole field. I should like to see statistics from the whole 
State. I doubt not that they will show about the same thing now as formerly. 
I have something to say in regard to the licensing of respectable places. It 
is proposed by the license party, as I understand, to license the respectable 
places, and to shut up the low, mean places. It seems to me that the increase 
of crime among us of late has been very largely among the better class of 
people ; among men of better character, of better position, of better means. 
Who is it that makes it unsafe for ladies to walk the streets of our city alone 
in the evening ? I undertake to say that it is not the low, beastly fellows ; it 
is not the poor, degraded foreigners, nor Yankees, as low and debased as 
they ; but it is your fast young men who have been permitted to accost, on 
terms of equality, ladies, who had some character. When they get liquor in 
them, they will insult ladies in the street. Our murders and robberies have 
been committed by men of considerable character. Crime is not so largely 
to be laid at the doors of the lower portion of the community as formerly. 
My observations have confirmed me in this judgment. 

There are some things that should be remembered by this Committee, and 
by the Legislature, in regard to the men who come here and ask for a change 
of this law. It is of some consequence whether they have been men who 
have been habitual violators of the law. If these men had submitted to the 
law, and neither by their practice induced others to sell, nor sold themselves ; 
if they had done neither one thing nor the other during the years that we 
have had this law upon the statute book, their present testimony in favor of a 
change might be worthy more attention. That consideration, I think, has 
something to do with the merit of their testimony. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) To what particular murders do you refer? 

A. I have no memorandum with me, and I could not tell you, but I have 
noticed that a large proportion of the persons were very respectably connected. 

Q. Were they brought to commit the offences by intemperance ? 

A. In some cases they were and in some cases they were not ; that is not 
the point. 

Q. You were talking about intemperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



656 APPENDIX. 

Q. And those cases of murder to ■which you refer were committed under 
the influence of liquor ; what are the cases, where respectable young men 
have committed murder under the influence of liquor ? 

A. I could not name the cases. 
Q. Can you name one ? 

A. I do not know that I can. I have not remarked the fact with that 
idea. 

Q. Where did you get the idea ? 

A. A great deal has been said about licensing respectable places, and I 
have been looking to see what has been the effect of such a practice. The 
effect, on the whole, has been an increase of intemperance and an increase of 
crime. 

Q. Can you state where it was said that there was an increase of crime ? 

A. I have looked to see where it was. 

Q. And if you have looked, you have found it, have you not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. If your judgment has been assisted by the facts that you have observed, 
I should think that at least one of those facts would remain in your memory. 

A . I do not remember any individual case. When I have read of a case 
of murder, or of an assault that has ended in death, I have inquired, in my 
mind, into it, and I think that two out of three, of those I have noticed, bore 
to my mind that testimony. 

Q. Take those cases which have occurred in Massachusetts during any 
series of years ; will you refer to one case where a person of decent respecta- 
bility and standing in society, who has committed a homicide, has done it 
under the influence of liquor ? 

A. I hold this to be true : if I should see a young man coming in here and 
talking a little extravagantly, not very much under the influence of liquor, 
but still talking and acting as he would not if he were not under its influence, 
I should take it that liquor had something to do with it. 

Q. I should be very sorry to accuse all who have been extravagant on this 
stand of having taken liquor, should not you ? 

A. I said if he was affected by liquor, I should take it that what he did 
was the effect of what he had taken. 

Q. I do not care how much or how little the effect. Give us a single case 
where any person that you call respectable has committed homicide under the 
influence of liquor. 

A. I have no case to cite ; but that is not the point I aimed to make. I 
aimed to say that a large proportion of the crimes of a grievous nature, at the 
present time, are committed, not by persons of the low and base class, but by 
the more respectable class ; and if you make liquor more accessible to this 
class, the probability is that crime will be increased. 

Q. Then you leave entirely without remark the statement you just made 
concerning murder ? Do you stand by that or retire from it ? 

A. I do not say that a majority of the crimes committed have been com- 
mitted by those who were under the influence of liquor ; but by persons of 
better education and better habits, who are going to be led more and more to 



APPENDIX. 657 

commit such acts by the liquor they will bo ablo to obtain under a license 
law. 

Q. Then a large portion of the grave offences committed in society are 
committed by persons of respectable standing ? 

A. Yes, sir. I do not want to say exactly " respectable standing," but by 
men who occupy good social positions. 

Q. Then your statement is, that a large proportion of the grave offences 
are committed by men who occupy a good social position. Now, do you find 
those offences to have boen committed under the influence of liquor ? 

A. In many cases ; but that is not the point I am making. 

Q. If the offences are not committed under the influence of liquor, I do 
not soe how their consideration can be of any value in the present hearing ? 

A. I will tell you again. I take it for granted that the use of liquor tends to 
the production of crime upon the part of those who use it. That, I suppose, is 
acknowledged upon all hands. The petitioners want a law restraining the 
use, bocause it produces crimes. Therefore, I take that for granted. You say 
that it is proposed in the license law (and I object to it upon that ground), to 
license respectable places, so that the low and vile will not be able to get 
liquor, and only the respectable people can get it. Now, I say that the crimes 
of the country are not so largely committed by men of the baser sort as among 
a more respectable class, and by those who can obtain their liquors in these 
respectable places ; therefore, I say the traffic in liquor will tend to continue 
if not to increase the crime committed by that class. 

Q. But I do not understand you as saying that these offences have been 
caused or procured or influenced by the fact of drinking ? 

A. I do not say one thing or the other about that. 

Q. You do not show or offer any evidence tending to show that ? 

A. No, sir ; that is a matter which everybody understands. I do not 
wish to prove that. If I had supposed that I was to come here to advocate 
the fundamental principles of the temperance cause, I would have come 
with a different speech. 

Q. I want to get at the facts that are in your possession. You have been 
undertaking to give testimony of opinions, which opinions you would have us 
understand have been induced by facts known to you . 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now I want to know what facts form the basis upon which your 
opinion rests. Although you say that a very large proportion of the criminal 
offences in society are committed by men in good social position, I do not 
understand you to say that those offences have been caused or influenced by 
drink? 

A. If that is a point that comes in here, I am ready to answer it, and say 
that I think that a very large proportion of the crimes committed in the 
country are brought about by the use of liquor. 

Q. And are the criminal offences committed by people of good social 
position committed under the influence of liquor ? 

A. A portion of them ; I think a good many of them are. 

Q. Can you recall any cases that will illustrate your position ? 

A. I cannot name any now. 

83 



658 APPENDIX. 

Q. Not one ? 

A. No, sir. I take the papers and look over the items; I see it reported 
that a man is killed, or a serious assault is committed, or some outrage 
attempted ; I endeavor to ascertain how many of the crimes were committed 
by the vicious portion of the community, and how many by persons of a better 
class — better educated — who occupy better social positions, and would be 
admitted into any respectable place. It is my conviction that a very large 
portion have been committed under these circumstances. 

Q. Have you ever examined the statistics of any statistical society, or of 
any board of social science, or of any committee, or of any man of learning, 
in regard to this matter ? 

A. No, sir ; I have inquired if there were such, but do not know where to 
find anything that will give me the information, and I doubt whether there 
has ever been any investigation upon that point. 

Q. Have you any knowledge of any facts tending to prove that crime has 
been constantly, and for more than a generation continually receding and 
growing less and less, both in number, quality and degree among those people 
who are called respectable, and of good social position ? 

A. I presume that is true. I do not contradict it. I think that people 
who wear good cloth and are persons of fair education and good social posi- 
tion are very likely to be criminal, and if there are rum-shops where such 
men can go and get their liquor, as the sale of rum multiplies crime, it will 
multiply crime among that class. 

Q. Have you ever known any town or place where men of that descrip- 
tion could not get intoxicating beverages if they want it ? 

A Yes, sir ; they could not buy it in our town. The great trouble in the 
past has been, that you could not get any Massachusetts law in Boston, and 
they could therefore obtain liquor here. 

Q. The means of intoxication, then, can be procured by those who so 
desire ? 

A. I think, nevertheless, that the remark is true, that very many young 
men, who get their liquor at respectable places, would not drink at all if no 
liquor was sold in respectable places. 

Q. We are considering the relation of crime to intemperance ; you intro- 
duced the topic, and I am cross-examining you upon it. I do not think that 
it is a fair treatment of the subject for you now to retire from that to another 
topic. You have not, if I understand you, made any investigations which 
enable you to show from any statistics of any sort, the relation which exists 
between drunkards and crime, among the people of that class ? 

A. I do not propose to introduce that subject here at all. My objection 
to a license law is that it opens places for young men to go and drink, who 
otherwise would not drink, and because of their drinking are likely to become 
criminals. 

Q. Your objection, then, is to the drinking places ? 
A. Yes, sir ; the law proposes to open them, and I object to it. 
Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Do you wish to be understood as saying that you 
prefer that liquor should be sold by disreputable persons in groggeries, rather 
than by respectable persons ? 
A. Yes, sir. 



APPENDIX. 659 

Testimony of Oliver R. Clark. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You reside in Winchester ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Your business is in Boston ? 

A. It is. 

Q. How long have you resided in Winchester ? 

A. Thirty years, and have been in business in Boston twenty-five years. 

Q. What is the state of temperance in Winchester ? 

A. We find the law very effectually in suppressing intemperance. During 
the last twelve years I have served upon the Board of Selectmen and have 
had pretty intimate knowledge of the working of the law in our midst. 

Q. Will you describe its working ? 

A. We have been enabled by it very effectual to suppress the sale of 
liquor. No places openly sell, and in a few instances we have been able to 
suppress the secret sale. Since the State Constabulary has been in opera- 
tion we have done it very effectually. All the liquor that can be obtained has 
been got of the liquor agency most of the time. We have found the liquor 
agency working well, if we could get a temperance man to take the agency. 
If a true lover of the law took the agency, there was no fault found with the 
liquors. But sometimes we have had men who didn't love the law as they 
ought, and they have purchased their liquor in one or two instances away 
from the State Agency ; and in such cases we have had complaints of their 
liquors. 

Q. Odium has been brought, I suppose, upon the State Agency by liquors 
purchased elsewhere ? 

A. It seemed to be so. It is not a matter that I can positively state, how- 
ever. 

Q. You spoke of their being no open sale. Can there be a secret sale to 
any great extent after such sale has been detected ? 

A. The secret sales are very limited indeed. If there has been any secret 
sale, and it becomes known, the constables suppress it immediately. This has 
been done in two cases. 

Q. Do you believe that one-tenth part is sold that would be> sold if free 
privilege was given to every one ? 

A. Not one-tenth part is now sold that there was once sold in my remem- 
brance, when the place was not half as large as now. My place of business 
in Boston is right in the heart of the low groggeries. 

Q. What is your business ? 

A. Lumber-dealer, at the corner of Beverly and Traverse Streets. There 
are a great many groggeries on Charlestown Street, which are also in sight 
of my place of business. Two of them have been closed by the State Con- 
stables within one month. One of them, I think, has been re-opened. During 
the last three months I have not seen the number of drunken persons in that 
vicinity, that I previously did. I know from my own observation that the sale 
of liquor there has decreased ; and I have found, also, that those who are 
most strenuous for this license law, to be persons who were influenced, as I 
believe, by their pecuniary interests, or else by their love of strong drink. 
The respectable, religious, solid men of the country towns whom I know (I 



660 APPENDIX. 

am acquainted with a great many besides my own), are almost universally in 
favor of the prohibitory law. I should say that in the country towns, nine-tenths 
of all the voters with the dominant party of this State, were in favor of that law. 
I remember distinctly when the fifteen-gallon keg law was in operation, and 
remember that in the small country town in which I was born, groggery after 
groggery was opened under that license law, which are now entirely closed. 

Q. What town is that ? 

A. The town of Tewksbury. The places there are closed up now. I do 
not believe that in that town there is a single place where liquor can be 
obtained. If it is sold at all, it is done underhandedly, and to no consider- 
able extent. I am not as well acquainted there, however, as where I now 
live. I think that my facilities for knowing the operations of the law are very 
good, from the fact that I have resided in the country and done business in 
the city, remaining here during the day-time. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you think that this law of prohibition is 
sound in principle and expedient and practicable in its details and successful 
in its operation ? 

A . I think it is, or might be made so as much as any human law ? 

Q. Do you think all the facts tend to prove that ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. Are you aware of any motive or consideration which ought to operate 
upon the minds of this Committee other than such facts and such arguments 
as may be fairly offered, and such inferences as by way of argument may be 
fairly deduced from those facts ? 

A. I would have every influence that can be brought to bear operate upon 
this Committee in favor of temperance. 

Q. Do you think there is any other motive which ought to influence the 
Committee, save such motives as those which I have indicated, — regard for 
the facts in the case bearing upon the value and expediency and wisdom of 
the law itself ? 

A . I would add also, the highest welfare of the citizens of this Common- 
wealth. 

Q. They ought to be influenced then, by their views of the welfare of the 
Commonwealth ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. By their views of the wisdom and expediency of the law and the 
welfare of the Commonwealth ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you think they ought to be influenced by anything else ? 

A. I would bring to bear every good influence in favor of temperance ? 

Q. Do you think they ought to be influenced by anything else excepting 
sound argument and the facts of the case ? 

A. I think that they should take the testimony of a prejudiced rumseller, 
for instance, with a great deal of caution. 

Q. Do you think that the facts which tend to elicit the true state of the 
case are so difficult of access that there is no danger to the Committee in 
rejecting facts ? 

A. No, sir. I think the facts are very easy of access. 



APPENDIX. 661 

Q. Do you think it easy to arrive at a just conclusion from the facts ? 

A. I think it would not be if I was a member of this Committee. 

Q. That being so, what reason, sense or excuse is there for the aspersion 
in your testimony of the character of other gentlemen who differ from you 
in opinion, that in your judgment all religious, sensible and solid men think 
as you do. 

A. I said that in my judgment the majority of the religious, solid men of 
the community in which I live thought as I do ; and they do. 

Q. Supposing that they think so, what right have you to attempt to 
influence the Committee in a matter in which they should bring their own 
judgment to bear independently of the judgment of other people, by attempt- 
ing to asperse those who differ from you in opinion ? I understood you to 
say that in your judgment nine-tenths of the people of Massachusetts who 
vote, as you expressed it, " with the dominant party " were in favor of the 
prohibitory law ? 

A. That is true of the towns with which I am acquainted. 

Q. Not then of the Commonwealth, but only of a certain range of towns ? 

A. A fair sample, however, of the towns of the Commonwealth. 

Q. If the facts are accessible and the reasons are within easy reach, the 
Committee and the Legislature ought to be governed by the fact and are in 
no danger of being misled. What occasion have you to go outside of the 
facts and reasons legitimately bearing upon the question and asperse your 
neighbors who differ from you in opinion ? 

A. I have not done it. 

Q. By assuming that all those who are religious, solid and respectable, 
think with you ? 

A. I have not done any such thing. 

Q. Will you state what you meant to say ? 

A. I meant to say just what I did say, that the solid, religious, respecta- 
ble men in my own community, a majority of them and a very large majority 
of them, are in favor of this prohibitory law. 

Q. Why do you venture that opinion ? 

A . I know it to be a fact. 

Q. What if it be a fact? 

A. It ought to weigh with this Committee, and I hope it will. 

Q. You mean to say you think the Committee ought to be influenced in 
their judgment by your opinion of your neighbors' opinion, and not be 
governed by their own judgment of the facts of the case ? 

A, I think they ought to be influenced by the opinion of sound, solid, 
religious men in the community. 

Q. You come in as one of them and give your opinion, but do you think 
the Committee ought to be influenced by your opinion or by the opinions of 
others ? 

A. I give you my testimony and you can take it for what it is worth ; it is 
true. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) I understand you to say that in your opinion 
nine-tenths of those who act in the dominant party are in favor of the present 
law? 



662 APPENDIX. 

A. I spoke of my own vicinity. 

Q. You are acquainted also with business men in Boston ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Then do you express it as your opinion that nine-tenths of those who 
act with the dominant party are in favor of the prohibitory law ? 

A . I do not think it is so in Boston. I think the liquor interest is stronger 
here. 

Q. I do not ask you to make any discrimination as to place. 

A. I do in Boston. 

Q. I ask you whether or not you know the opinion of any of the people 
of Boston ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Taking the persons that you know everywhere in Boston and out of 
Boston, do you wish to be understood as saying that nine-tenths of them who 
act with the dominant party are in favor of the present law V 

A. I make an exception of Boston. 

Q. I do not ask you to except where people live, or where they do busi- 
ness ; but I ask your opinion as to the views of those persons whom you know, 
wherever they are ? 

A. My belief is that the Commonwealth is overwhelmingly in favor of the 
prohibitory law; but I think if you take it in Boston you might find 
opposition. 

Q. But the cities ought to be counted in as well as the small towns. I 
ask you, taking the people whom you know in all parts of the State, what do 
you wish to give the Committee as your opinion of their sentiment — for or 
against the present law ? 

A. I think the vast majority of the people of the Commonwealth, including 
those of Boston, are in favor of it. 

Q. What proportion ? 

A. You ask me a question that I cannot well answer. If you ask me of 
twelve towns in Middlesex County that I know intimately, I can give you the 
proportion. I will make a guess if that is what you want. 

Q. I do not ask you to give any opinion in regard to persons whom you 
do not know ; but take the people whom you know. If you know a man you 
know him as well in one place as in another. Take the people whom you 
know, wherever they live ; what is your opinion as to the sentiment of those 
who act with the dominant party ? 

A . Two-thirds of them are in favor of the prohibitory law. 

Q. Taking those same persons, what do you find to be their habits in 
regard to the use of every kind of liquor including cider ? 

A. Most of them are consistent, strong temperance men, and some as 
strong as I am myself. I do not touch your wine, beer or any other liquor. 

Q. Do you suppose that a majority of those who act with the dominant 
party in this State abstain entirely from the use of all liquors, including cider 
and beer ? 

A. Those whom I know intimately do. 

Q. Is it your opinion that a majority do ? 



APPENDIX. 663 

A. I always give the most favorable construction to the actions of my 
fellow -men that I can. 

Q. Do you think that a majority of them do in Boston ? 

A. I do. I hope they do at least. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) What, in your opinion, is the sentiment of the 
virtuous and intelligent women in the communities in which you are 
acquainted upon this subject ? Are they or not in favor of prohibition ? 

A. I think they are in favor of prohibition. I do not know a woman of 
my acquaintance who is not. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) When you say that, in your opinion, the virtuous 
and intelligent women of communities are in favor of prohibition, would you 
have us infer that those who are not in favor of it are not virtuous ? 

A . No, sir. Yesterday I was at a gathering of two thousand of the Chris- 
tian men and women of this Commonwealth, at which I presided. They 
passed a vote without a single dissenting voice, asking this Legislature not to 
grant a license law. The largest church in Middlesex County was filled. 
The petition, I suppose, will soon come before you. 

Testimony of Hon. George Marston. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You have been the prosecuting officer in Barn- 
stable County for several years ? 

A. Yes, sir, in the southern district which comprises the counties of 
Barnstable, Dukes, Bristol and Nantucket. 

Q. What success have you met with in prosecuting the existing law ? 

A. If you mean by that to ask what success I have had in procuring con- 
victions, I answer there has been no difficulty in doing it except in one of the 
recent terms. 

Q. What effect has the law had in dimininishing the number of places 
where liquor is sold and in keeping them down ? 

A. In Bristol County, in New Bedford, Taunton and Fall River, I have 
no doubt there is a good deal of selling ; but taking the district as a whole, 
the liquor traffic has decreased very much. 

Q. Do you think it perfectly practicable to. enforce the law, in these 
places ? 

A. I suppose that Massachusetts can enforce any law. 

Q. Do you think it practicable to enforce it in Boston ? 

A. It can be done. 

Q. There has been a great deal said here about the increase of intemper- 
ance. What is your observation in regard to that ? 

A . I think there has been a manifest decrease. 

Q. Do you think the temperance practice and principle is gaining ground ? 

A. You ask me about the increase of intemperance. I say that intemper- 
ance has decreased. I go no farther than that. I do not know about the 
private practice and convictions of the people. 

Q. Is there anything you would like to say upon this subject further ? 

A. As a member of the Legislature, I may have something more to say by 
and by. I think, at present, I ought to go no further or be asked to go no 



664 APPENDIX. 

further than giving any facts which arc within my knowledge, connected with 
my official relation to the prosecution of the present law. 

Testimony of Rev. Albert H. Plumb. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You reside in Chelsea ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is the state of the temperance cause there ? 

A. We think it very much improved. 

Q. Since when ? 

A. Lately, especially within the last year. 

Q. Do you think there is any real open sale of liquor in Chelsea now ? 

A. I do not think there is much. There may be some. 

Q. You do not have much trouble from intemperance there, I suppose ? 

A. We have had a great deal. I find that the testimony of families and 
physicians, and others whom I meet, is that the streets are a great deal more 
quiet, and that the neighborhoods where the lower class of people live who 
used to have frequent drunken brawls, are more quiet now. The sale of 
liquor is not to be had, and there is not so much noise as formerly. Neighbor- 
hoods that were formerly very troublesome, are quiet and peaceable now. 

Q. I would like to know what is the practice of the churches within your 
observation, whether the habits of persons in regard to the use of liquor are 
taken into consideration when they are proposed for admission into the 
church ? 

A. I think it is. 

Q. Is there a strict rule about that in your church or any other churches 
that you are aware of? 

A. I do not think that there is any rule. The point always aimed at by 
the examining committee, I suppose, is to ask such practical questions as in 
their judgment will bring out the fact as to their moral and religious charac- 
ters. I think it would be a bar to the admission of any man if he were known 
to be an habitual user, although he were never known to drink to excess. 

Q. Is that true of other churches besides your own ? 

A . I think it is, sir. 

Q. Suppose a liquor-dealer should be proposed for admission, what would 
be the result ? 

A. I never heard of such a case. I do not think it one very likely to 
occur. I do not think there would be any difference of opinion among 
Christians with whom I am acquainted, not but that there may be some 
liquor-dealers very gentlemanly and pleasant neighbors ; but I am not aware 
that they commonly make pretensions to religious character. 

Q. Is it not the universal judgment of the church with which you are con- 
nected or acquainted, so far as you know and believe, that a man who habitu- 
ally engages in the traffic of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, is unsuited for 
the church, that he is in an immoral and bad business ? 

A. That is my own opinion, and I think it is the opinion very generally 
among Christian people of all denominations. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You have a sort of common law, I suppose, which 
is not expressed in written rule ? 



APPENDIX. 665 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the opinions you have expressed in reference to the judgment 
and practico and discipline of the church is based upon that unwritten law ? 

A. Yes, sir ; it is made up from precedent. 

Q. Do you desire that the State should be more rigid in its written law 
than the church in this respect ? 

A. The State is called upon to regard public morality in a way that the 
church is not. 

Q. Is that your idea of the relative office of the Church and State ? 

A. The government assumes responsibilities that the church does not. 

Q. Do you understand that it is any part of the office of the State in this 
country to guard morality by criminal laws — that it is any part of the duty or 
right of the State in this country ? 

A. Yes, sir, that is my opinion, that the State is to endeavor to guard the 
interests of morality. The State passes laws against crime, not only against 
those who steal but against those who receive stolen goods ; and I suppose that 
our present prohibitory law is very similar to that. The State does not expect 
to suppress thieving altogether, or the sale of liquor, but we can do a great 
deal of legislation in such suppression, if, in the sentiment of the Christian 
Commonwealth, such acts are considered offences against good morals. 

Adjourned. 

84 



m APPENDIX. 



NINETEENTH DAY. 

Friday, March 22, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony was 
resumed. 

Testimony of Hon. Roland G. Usher. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are Mayor of Lynn, I believe ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is this your first year in office ? 

A. Second year. 

Q. The question before the Committee is, mainly, the expediency of pro- 
hibiting or licensing the sale of liquors as beverages. We would like, very 
briefly, your opinion, and any facts you may be called upon to state in con- 
nection therewith. 

A. I am opposed to any change in the law at present. So far, the State 
Constabulary have been successful in all their attempts to enforce the law in 
our city. 

Q. Do you perceive the result of their efforts in the state of the traffic in 
your city ? 

A. I think I do, sir. I think there is less drunkenness in Lynn than ever 
before since my remembrance. 

Q. Is the sentiment of the leading men of your city favorable, in your 
judgment, to the continuance of the law ? 

A. I should say that it was — a majority. 

Q. Is the traffic as open in your place as formerly ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. I do not think there is an open bar in the city of 
Lynn to-day. 

Q. Whatever sale there is, is clandestine, secret ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In your judgment, has the number of such places increased or dimin- 
ished? 

A. They have been diminished recently, sir. 

Q. What is your opinion 'as to the prevalence of intemperance, as com- 
pared with former periods ? 

A . I believe, as I said before, that there is less drunkenness to-day in the 
city of Lynn than there has been since my remembrance. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Are you a native of Lynn ? 

A. I have resided there since I was nine years of age. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) There is intemperance in Lynn, as in other places ? 

A. Oh, yes, sir. 

Q. Do you know anything as to the fact whether or not there are secret 
places where liquor is sold ? 



APPENDIX. 667 

A. Only from report. 

Q. Are there reports to that effect ? 

A. Yes, sir. It is the impression that there are. 
Q. But how extensive these are, you cannot tell ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You have arrests for drunkenness, I suppose ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you have reports of these, daily or weekly ? 

A. We have them monthly. 

Q. Have you made any comparison between your monthly reports now, 
and two years ago ? 

A. I have not, myself. I gave that to some officer of the State, who 
called upon me for it. 

Q. Are there any of these secret clubs of young men in Lynn where they 
buy liquor by the quantity, and resort to these places to drink it ? 

A. There are said to be. 

Q. Do you know how extensive those are ? 

A. No, sir, not from personal knowledge. 

Q. Then, whether there is more or less liquor drank now than four months 
ago or two years ago, you have no means of telling ? 

A. Only so far as my observation goes. In passing through the city, I see 
there is less apparent drunkenness than ever before. 

Q. My question was whether you had any means of telling whether there 
was more or less liquor drank now than two years ago, or at previous 
periods ? You do not know, I suppose ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. If there is secret drinking, you do not know how much is drank ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. Do you know whether what is called temperate drinking is more or 
less than it used to be ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. You are, then, unable to form any opinion whether the consumption 
of liquor as a beverage, by all classes in Lynn, is less or more than formerly ? 

A. Only by general observation. 

Q. I do not suppose your general observation could indicate every person 
who drank a glass of wine in an evening meeting of one of those clubs, would 
it? 

A. I am unable to say. 

Q. You say there are no open bars in Lynn. Do you know whether the 
expressmen, and other common carriers, do any business in the way of carry- 
ing liquor to Lynn and other places ? 

A. Not from personal knowledge. 

Q. The amount of your testimony, then, is, if I understand it rightly, that 
the open places have been chiefly closed in Lynn ? 

A. I do not think there is an open bar in the city of Lynn. 

Q. And you think you see less drunkenness in the streets than formerly ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



668 APPENDIX. 

Q. Whether there is more or less drinking in secret now than heretofore, 
you have no means of judging ? 

A. I am unable to say whether there is more or less. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have the clubs which you say exist in Lynn been 
the growth of the last few months, or the last year or two, or are they a pecu- 
liarity, somewhat, of the shoe men ? 

A. There have been more or less club-rooms set up in Lynn, for the last 
ten or eleven years. 

Q. Is it true that the manufacturers and the shoemakers have their 
respective clubs, — classifying themselves somewhat in clubs ? 

A. I do not know that that is so. 

Q. But there have been clubs among the shoe men for several years ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you aware that they are drinking places ? 

A. No, sir, I do not think they are, so much as has been represented. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) The clubs I referred to you said you did not know 
anything about ; but I inquired whether you had understood that there were 
any of those clubs which were drinking clubs ? 

A. When you ask me to give my opinion, I will do so ; but I cannot say 
how much liquor is drank. 

Q. You said they were drinking clubs. 

A. No, sir, I did not say they were for drinking. I take it back, if I did. 

Q. The question put to you was, whether there had not sprung up clubs 
of young men who met in private places, procured liquor, in quantities greater 
or smaller, which they kept there, and then resorted there to drink it. What 
is you answer ? 

A. I do not know of any club-room that is formed with the special idea of 
using it as a drinking club. 

Q. Is it reported that there are such ? 

A. I have heard so. 

Q. And is it reported that these have increased within the last year ? 

A. I should say that it had been reported so, although I am not certain. 
I think the impression is, that they have increased, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do- you mean, in the number of clubs, or in the 
membership ? 

A. In the number of clubs, I should say the impression was. 

Testimony of Hon. Charles A. Dewey. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are Judge of the Police Court of Milford ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you held that office ? 

A. I have held that office three years, but was Trial Justice before. I 
have held the office of Trial Justice and Judge of the Police Court for the 
last six years. 

Q. Were you acquainted with Judge Dewey, of the Supreme Court ? 

A. Yes, sir ; he was my father. 

Q. Will you state the results of your observations as bearing upon the 
question before us ? 



APPENDIX. 669 

A. It seems to me that the prohibitory law has never been so well enforced 
before as it has been during the last six months or so. 

Q. Do you perceive any results of that enforcement in the condition of 
the traffic, and the state of the cause of temperance ? 

A. Yes, sir. I think that it has changed my opinion somewhat, with 
regard to the practicability of the enforcement of the prohibitory law. I 
think that it could be enforced under the present system. The present Con- 
stabulary system seems to me to have aided very much in the enforcement of 
the law. 

Q. You say it has changed your opinion. You formerly had less confi- 
dence in the practicability of its enforcement ? 

A. I think it can be enforced much more easily and efficiently through a 
State Constabulary force than it could under the former system of State Con- 
stables. 

Q. Do you find anything in the mode of election of town officers and 
municipal officers which tends to inefficiency in the enforcement of local 
criminal law ? 

A. It seems to tend very strongly in that way, that is, in the town of 
Milford. Officers who did their duty and enforced the law became unpopu- 
lar, and were turned out of office. 

Q. Milford has had the reputation, I believe, of being what would be com- 
monly called " a hard place " in regard to drinking ? 

A. Yes, sir ; it has a very large foreign population. 

Q. Has it materially changed in that respect ? 

A. I do not know that it has, materially. There is still considerable sell- 
ing, and considerable drinking. I suppose it cannot be entirely prevented by 
any law among the foreign population, which consists principally of Irish, and 
they will sell and will drink. 

Q. What is the state of open drinking in Milford ? 

A. I think that is suppressed. There is no open bar there. 

Q. Have you any doubt as to the fact that the amount used there has 
much decreased ? 

A. I think it has considerably decreased. There have been several 
seizures made there of liquor, one to a very large amount, about as large as 
any in the State. 

Q. How large ? 

A. About $5,000, or a little over that. Appeals have been taken in all 
these cases. That case was carried to the Supreme Court of the State and 
sustained by them. I believe it has now gone up to the United States Court. 
Perhaps I should say that it seems to me the law could be enforced much 
better, provided that these legal questions which have been raised should be 
finally decided by the Supreme Court of the United States. That has been 
one of the great obstacles in the enforcement of the law — the uncertainty in 
regard to the decisions of these legal questions. 

Q. You understand that these questions are substantially decided ? 

A . I believe they are now ; and I think that those who sell liquor begin to 
feel that they are decided against them. 



670 APPENDIX. 

Q. So that you feel that we are, in a legal point of view, approaching the 
hour when we may expect far greater results from the execution of the law ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. Is there any other fact you would like to state ? 

A. I don't know that there is any other. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Judge Dewey, although the open bars are closed in 
Milford, is the sale of liquor to be drank common there ? 

A . I suppose there is considerable sold there yet, sir. 

Q. Have you any means of judging whether the amount sold for use has 
diminished since the closing of the public bars ? 

A. I don't know that I could say I have the means of judging. I only 
know that those who do sell have a very small quantity of liquor on hand. 

Q. When the State Constables are about, I suppose they don't mean to 
have a great deal on hand ? 

A. No, sir, I suppose not. I stated before that I thought it had diminished. 

Q. Have you any accurate means of forming an opinion, whether it has or 
not ? Have you any facts or is it a matter of opinion from ordinary 
observation ? 

A. There is less liquor to be found at those places, at many places, hardly 
any, where formerly there was a great deal. 

Q. You would expect, when prosecutions were going on and the places 
closed, that the sales would be secret, if made at all ? 
. A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you any facts, from which you can form an opinion, that the 
amount of sales, open and secret together, are now less than they were when 
they were all open ? 

A. I should think they must be. 

Q. Have you any facts ? 

A. I think there is less drunkenness there- 

Q. You say your opinion has changed in regard to the administration of 
the law. Until recently, was it ever enforced at all in Milford, to amount to 
anything ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long ago ? 

A. It has been for a number of years. It depended entirely upon the 
officers elected by the town. If they elected efficient constables, who were 
disposed to enforce it, it would be enforced. Some years they would enforce 
it, and some years they would not. 

Q. Was there ever anything like an efficient enforcement of the law 
before ? 

A. It has been enforced much more efficiently under the present system. 

Q. Before that, was its enforcement worthy to be called efficient ? 

A. Well, at times ; but still it was not very vigorously enforced. 

Q. There would be times when there would be a movement, and the 
liquor-shops would be apparently closed ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Then there would come times when the enforcement was inefficient, 
and the liquor-shops would be opened again ? 



APPENDIX. 671 

A. Yes, sir. They would sell openly for a long time. 

Q. There have been these changes, up and down, for a long period of 
time? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. While the prohibitory law is enforced upon the lower and the smaller 
places, and the large hotels are not meddled with at all, can there, in that 
state of things, be any efficient enforcement of the law for any length of 
time V 

A. I think it can be enforced to a great extent. It seems to me that the 
sale of intoxicating liquor could be prevented in those places a great deal 
easier than it could in the low grog-shops. 

Q. Take one of the large importing houses in Boston who sell liquor to 
everybody, in great or small quantities. If there should be no attempt to 
enforce it there, will any attempt to enforce it upon the lower or smaller places 
continue to have any perceptible effect after a few months ? 

A. I think it would have considerable effect, though I do not think the 
selling could be entirely prohibited among the lower classes. 

Q. Do you think the selling could be entirely prohibited anywhere, lower 
or higher ? 

A. I think it might be, as I said before, in the higher classes. If the 
Legislature are determined to enforce the prohibitory law, I think that in 
time they will enforce it, as far as the heaviest of it is concerned. 

Q. Do you believe that in the higher classes you will ever get it so they 
cannot buy rum ? 

A . I speak of the higher classes of liquor-sellers. 

Q. So long as a portion of the community who come under the denomina- 
tion of respectable and higher classes, (I use the term " higher classes " only 
to indicate what I mean, for I do not believe much in classes,) so long as they 
are in the habit of constantly using, to a greater or less extent, wine, do you 
believe it can be enforced ? Do you believe you can prevent the sale of it to 
that class of men by any means ? 

A. Not entirely. 

Q. Do you believe that in the county of Worcester you can enforce the 
cider clause, so long as the farmers make cider and use it, and sell some of it, 
and drink it when it is sweet ? 

A. I should think it could be. 

Q. Have you ever had a prosecution in your court for selling cider ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Well, how would it be in the interior — the farming towns ? 

A. I cannot judge very well of that. 

Q. Do you suppose that you could prevent the sale by one farmer to 
another of a barrel of cider that he had made in his cider-press ? 

A. I don't know that I could say about that. I have not the means of 
judging. 

Q. If I understand, then, the amount of your opinion is, that with the 
lower classes, the sale would not, by any law, be entirely stopped, and that the 
sale to the higher classes will never, by any prohibitory law, be entirely sup- 
pressed. If that is to be the state of facts, and there could be a system 



672 APPENDIX. 

devised that would restrain the sale of liquors to both the higher and lower 
classes, as much as, as a matter of fact, the prohibitory law would restrain it, 
would it not be better to have such a law than to have a prohibitory law, that 
is so extensively violated, or violated constantly, more or less ? 

A. I don't know how it could be done under any other law. 

Q. That is not the question. You have given the fact, that there always 
will be sales to the higher and lower classes, under the prohibitory law. 
These sales, of course, are constant violations of this law. Now, if there 
could be any arrangement provided by which that necessary sale, if you 
please to call it so, (necessary, because it always will be,) can be supplied 
according to law, and restrained there, would it not be better than to have it 
sold in violation of law constantly ? 

A. I think not, sir. 

Q. We know there are all kinds of laws that are more or less broken, but 
is it not, in principle, an evil to have a law, highly criminal, severe in its 
penalties, with the common understanding, by everybody, that that law is to 
be violated, more or less ? 

A . I think it is an evil, in some respects ; it may be counterbalanced. 

Q. But it is an evil bearing upon the force of law, and the respect of the 
people for law, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir. I think it gives rise to a great deal of perjury. 

Q. But does it not lessen the sense of obligation on the part of the commu- 
nity, however intelligent and however upright, to obey law, when it is 
expected, by all who support it, that it will be more or less violated ? 

A. Somewhat so. 

Q. Suppose it was the common sentiment that the law could not be 
enforced against stealing, what would be the effect of that upon the preva- 
lence of stealing ? 

A. It would be somewhat the same. 

Q. It is, then, an evil to have any law, highly criminal in its penalties, 
stand upon the statute book, with the common understanding by everybody 
that it cannot be enforced ? 

A. Certainly, if there is such an understanding. 

Q. In your observation, does not the greatest evil come from the open sale 
of liquor by the glass, in stores, cellars, bars, and everywhere else ? 

A. Yes, sir ; the greatest evil comes from that mode of selling. 

Q. Has not the selling in saloons, at bars, and other places where they sell 
by the glass, been the most prolific cause of intemperance, in your opinion ? 
' A. Yes, sir, I should think so. 

Q. Now, if those sales by the glass, to be drank at the time and place, 
could be entirely broken up, and at the same time a well restricted regulation 
established, that would furnish it to the people in the higher walks, who you 
say always will get it, would it not be better than a general restriction, with 
constant violations ? Without a general prohibitory law, could not the bars 
be broken up, and drinking on the premises ? 

A. It might, to some extent, but it seems to me this is a more efficient 
law, and one that is better for all persons. 



APPENDIX. 673 

Q. The State Constabulary being retained, what difficulty would there 
be in breaking up the sale by the glass, under a law that forbids that, 
although the same law might permit the sale by druggists for medicine, and 
the sale to families ? 

A. I have no doubt that a great deal could be accomplished by a good 
license law, but it seems to me the other would be more effective. 

Q. Would it not depend upon which was the most thoroughly executed, 
whether the one or the other would be more effective ? In other words, 
would not a license law, thoroughly carried out according to the terms of the 
law, be more effective than a broader law, not executed ? 

A. Very possibly. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) In your judgment that there probably would be 
some sale of liquors as beverages under the best execution of the law, do you 
mean to draw a very marked distinction between such crimes and other 
crimes ? 

A . No, sir. This law is . not so well enforced as some others ; probably 
cannot be so well enforced as some other laws. 

Q. But your judgment is, that this law would be far more efficient, 
honestly executed, than any license law possibly could be, in extinguishing 
the evils of intemperance ? 

A . Yes, sir. I think there are many persons who will sell, whatever may 
be the law. 

Q. Which, in your judgment, is a greater detriment to the moral sense of 
the community, a good law violated, or a bad law, embodying a falsehood, 
that should be obeyed ? 

A . I think that we ought to have good laws, and that they ought to be 
enforced. It has always seemed to me that it was an objection to the law, 
that it caused so much perjury ; there is a vast amount of it committed con- 
stantly in the Commonwealth ; and yet, notwithstanding the evils, it seems to 
me that it is a good law, and ought to be enforced. 

Q. And you think that the evils that would grow out of a law that should 
license an act as for the public good, which would be a public evil, would be 
greater than those that exist under the present law ? 
i A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you regard these evils as necessarily connected with this law, any 
more than with other criminal laws ? 

A. I think there would be more evils actually connected with it, in 
practice. 

Q. You spoke of this law being the " cause " of perjury. Strictly speak- 
ing, does it not rather furnish the occasion ? 

A. It furnishes the occasion. 

Q. Do not all criminal laws furnish like occasion ? 

A. Yes, sir, to some extent. 

Q. Have you any knowledge in regard to the enforcement of license laws, 
as connected with this disposition on the part of witnesses to perjure them- 
selves ? 

A. No, sir; I have not. 
85 



674 APPENDIX. 

Q. In view of the questions that will arise under the license law, as to 
whether liquor is drank on the premises where it is authorized to be sold to 
be carried away, lead to a complication of difficulties that does not pertain to 
the existing law ? 

A. Perhaps so. It seems to me that the sale of intoxicating liquor might 
be more effectually prevented by the prohibitory law than by a license law. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Did you not once reside in one of the Western 
States ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Which one? 

A. Iowa. 

Q. Do you know whether they had a license law there ? 

A. I think they did not. I never heard of any license law at that time. 
They sold openly, and very freely. There was a large German population 
there, who were constantly drinking beer. 

Q. Were the drinking habits of society in Iowa, among all classes, more 
general than here ? 

A. All classes seemed to drink much more. 

Q. Was not intemperance more general among all classes there than here ? 

A. I do not know as I could say about that. I do not think I saw more. 

Q. (By the Chairman.) As a matter of legislation, do I understand you 
to say you are in favor of the principle of the present law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony op Rev. Albert H. Plumb (recalled.) 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I learn that you have lived in New York previ- 
ously to coming to Chelsea ? 
■ A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long ago ? 

A. I was always a resident of Western New York, in Buffalo and that 
county, until eight years ago. 

Q. They had license laws in existence there ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did the license law then operate to suppress or restrain the traffic to 
any appreciable extent ? 

A. I do not think it did. It was found by experience that it was very 
difficult to prevent any kind of application for a license being granted. 

Q. Any one, as a general thing, could get a license, whatever his character 
might be ? 

A. Yes, sir. The law was thought to be very stringent in its requirements. 
The citizens of the town must certify to the good moral character of the 
applicant, — persons in office, individuals personally acquainted with the appli- 
cant, his neighbors ; but in practice, that was worthless. I remember a case in 
which the Supervisior of the town and the Justice of the Peace, both on the 
Board of Excise, and one or both members of the church, certified to the good 
moral character of a man whom they had within a month discharged from a 
mill in which they were engaged at that time, as an incorrigible thief. He had 
for a long time continued his depredations upon their property, until they 



APPENDIX. 675 

turned him out, for that reason and no other, and then certified to his good 
moral character ! It was considered a mere form, and amounted to nothing. 
There was at one time an effort made to change the law, and the Legislature 
gave the towns permission to refuse licenses, if they pleased. Every town 
was called upon to vote on that question ; great efforts were made by temper- 
ance men to influence public sentiment, and the towns very generally refused 
to grant licenses. But there was no sufficient penalty for selling without a 
license, and there was great difficulty in procuring convictions. They had 
no State Police, and it was a matter in which neighbors were very reluctant 
to move. And it was very difficult even to secure an unprejudiced and fair 
vote on the subject. The people of one town, I have no doubt, would feel 
very much stronger in their refusal to license if they were backed up by 
neighboring towns, and by the judgment of a large Commonwealth. It did 
not work well with us. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) The real trouble was in the disinclination of the 
people and their officers to carry out the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Was that disinclination on the part of the people and the men they 
put in power any fault of the law ? 

A. I think it was, in part, sir. 

Q. You say that this member of the church made a false certificate. Do 
you think the law had any influence in making him give that false certificate ? 

A. Perhaps not, sir ; but that fact was adduced to show that a license law, 
however stringent, unless accompanied by very heavy penalties, was not 
effectual in restraining the sale. 

Q. How did the insufficient penalty of the law tend to create a disposition 
on the part of that church-member to make a false certificate ? 

A. I don't know that he was influenced by that. 

Q. Really, had the law anything to do with that ? Was not the fault in 
the people — in the men whose duty it was to execute it, and in the people 
who put them in power ? 

A. Very likely, if there had been good men elected, they would have 
done differently. 

Q. Do you expect that any law will be executed unless it is sustained by 
the better judgment of the better class of the, community ? 

A. No, sir ; I suppose not, largely. 

Q. Then, after all, does not this question as to which law will operate best, 
a prohibitory or a license law, depend upon the public sentiment and the 
disposition of the community to execute one law or the other ? 

A. It depends, also, I judge, upon the opinion of the people, the better 
class of people, as to the righteousness of the law. There was a difficulty in 
respect to the license law. Good people said it brought them into a moral 
responsibility ; that they were responsible for sanctioning a trade which they 
looked upon as.no better than piracy; and they felt that a law which did not 
give a sanction and license and permission to immorality, would be better 
sustained by the hearty feeling of the good people of the Commonwealth. 

Q. Well, they believed that as far as the license law was executed, and as far 
as it prevented drinking and intemperance, the effect was good, did they not? 



676 APPENDIX. 

A. They might have thought the effect was good, and yet the law not 
good. The law was bad in principle. 

Q. Then because there was some principle in the law that they did not 
like, they would not avail themselves of what was good in it to accomplish a 
good result ? Do you mean that ? 

A. They did avail themselves of it as far as they could. 

Q. Exactly. But you say one church-member made a false certificate, 
and put a miserable fellow into the business ? 

A. That was one fact, and was adduced for another purpose. 

Q. I want the bearing of that fact upon your conclusion. You say you 
brought that up as an evil of the license law. Do you really think that illus- 
trates the evil of a license law at all ? 

A. Yes, sir, I do. 

Q. What evil of a license law does that illustrate ? 

A. The inefficiency of it. 

Q. Wherein does its inefficiency consist — in its provisions, or in the fact 
that proper men will not execute it ? 

A . The difficulty in that case was that the individuals were not inclined 
to enforce the law ; but supposing they had been, — get a law with all the 
stringent regulations that you please, and it will not be as effectual as a plain, 
straight-forward prohibition. There is the fault in the license law — it is inef- 
fectual because it does not positively prohibit ; it leaves to the judgment of 
men the question of granting licenses, which is affected by many considera- 
tions calculated to bias and prejudice them. And, furthermore, it leaves the 
question as to the fitness of applicants, as to whether they belong to the per- 
mitted class, to the judgment of individuals in their neighborhood, who are 
liable to be biased by many considerations, as was the fact in the case I have 
mentioned. 

Q. Would these men who gave that certificate have convicted a man for 
being drunk ? 

A . Yes, sir, I think they would. 

Q. Are you sure about that ? In a community that administers a law in 
that way by its officials, is there any such public sentiment as would execute 
any law ? 

A. Oh, yes, sir. 

Q. This law ? 

A . Yes, sir, I think so. 

Q. This law, without a public sentiment, can be executed, can it ? 

A. Public sentiment works a great deal more easily, and with less friction, 
in favor of a law which is sweeping in its prohibition, and which is sustained 
as a uniform principle, by the united judgment of the community. 

Q. You think that a community who will not avail themselves of the good 
qualities of a license law, because there is evil in it, will execute the other ? 

A. A great portion of the community, — the better portion,- — availed them- 
selves of the good there was in the license law. 

Q. Then you think the effect of these laws depends upon the correct 
principles embodied in them ? 

A . Very much, but not altogether. 



APPENDIX. 677 

Q. Do you call that a good principle, lying at the foundation of one of 
these laws, which is not true ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Is it true, in your judgment, that to sell a glass of cider or a gallon 
of cider is in every case a sin ? 

A. I do not think that is exactly the principle involved in the law. 

Q. The Committee will judge whether that be the principle of the law or 
not. I only ask, if that be the principle of the law, is it true that it is a sin, in 
all cases, to sell a glass of cider ? 

A. Well, sir, it may be of such immoral tendency, tending to, and insepa- 
rably connected with, the sale of other liquors, that it may be wise to include 
that. 

Q. My question is, is the act a sin ? You are a teacher of morals and 
religion, — is it a sin ? 

A. Well, for me to sell any intoxicating drink as a beverage, — I could sell 
it as a medicine, or to be used in the arts, — but to sell it to be drank as a 
beverage, looks to me like preying upon the good of society ; simply like 
piracy, or the slave-trade ; and, while there were slaveholders who were 
perhaps honest men, and did not commit sin in holding their fellows in bond- 
age, yet I think we were safe enough in saying, as a whole, that slaveholding 
was a sin. So I think liquor-selling might be classed as sin. 

Q. It might be for you and me. If I entertain an opinion that it is 
wrong to sell, and then, in violation of that opinion, I go and sell, I agree that 
I should be guilty ; but I am asking you if, in your judgment, the sale of this 
liquor, by all persons, under all circumstances, to be drank, is a sin ? 

A. We are permitted to prohibit a thing, even where the individual may be 
innocent in his act, comparatively. He is not very high-toned in his moral 
sentiments, and he is doing that which injures the community. It was right 
for us to prohibit the slave-trade, though men sometimes thought they could 
own an interest in a slaver, and yet be conscientious, good men. But it was 
such a manifest immorality, that we had a right to prohibit it. 

Q. That was a sin in itself. To undertake to sell a man for money, is as 
much a sin as anything can be. Now, is the sale by a druggist in Boston 
of a pint of whiskey, at the request of a physician, a sin ? 

A. I said I could sell it for medicine. 

Q. In violation of this law ? 

A. I do not suppose that this law is violated, when a man sells liquor for 
medicine. 

Q. It happens that it is. I mean, any druggist. 

A. Well, sir, there must be restrictions. 

Q. A party does not please to go to the State Agency, and he goes to a 
regular druggist in Boston ; the question is, whether it is a sin for the drug- 
gist to sell him this pint of whiskey to be used in his family as a medicine ? 

A. He should " please " to go there, because the public interest requires 
that the sale should be regulated ; and, if the druggist is a man who has the 
public welfare at heart, he will waive the right of selling liquor, and give it 
into the hands of the constituted agent. 



678 APPENDIX. 

Q. Suppose you have got no constituted agent ? A great many towns in 
the Commonwealth have not got any. 

A. Oh, well, that is an exceptional case. 

Q. Would it be wrong in every case, — that is what I want to get at, — to 
sell a glass of whiskey, or a pint of whiskey ? 

A. I have stated my opinion very clearly. I don't think it is material to 
the case to decide whether the sale of one glass is a sin in all cases or not. 

Q. Are you unwilling to give your opinion ? 

A. I gave my opinion very decidedly, that, in respect to myself, I could 
not sell a glass of liquor. In a case of necessity, I should sell it. If I saw a 
man dying for want of it, I should sell it. 

Testimony of James H. Upham. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are one of the town officers of the town of 
Dorchester ? 

A. I am one of the Selectmen of Dorchester. 

Q. Will you, in as brief manner as possible, state the condition of tem- 
perance in your town, and such facts as you may have in regard to the oper- 
ation of prohibition or license ? 

A. I can only speak, so far as the town of Dorchester is concerned, 
with reference to the illegal sale of intoxicating liquors. When I was first 
elected a member of the Board of Selectmen, four years ago this spring, I 
think I am safe in saying that there were forty places in the town of Dor- 
chester where liquor was sold publicly, in cellars, stores and saloons. I think 
I am equally safe in saying that there is not a place in Dorchester where 
liquor is sold now, excepting the two town agencies. The amount expended 
by the town of Dorchester for police services, three years ago, was eleven hun- 
dred and odd dollars. The amount expended last year was four hundred and 
thirty-seven dollars. From my observation, being a man of the people 
and among the people, I have a good opportunity of observing in this 
matter, and I am of the opinion that the amount of intemperance has very 
much decreased. 

Q. Within what period ? 

A . Within the last two years. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the policy of repealing, at this stage of the 
experiment, the present prohibitory law ? 

A. I think it would be very injudicious. 

Q. Would you feel it a calamity in your town ? 

A. Most assuredly I should, sir. 

Q. Are you aware whether other good citizens share in your opinion ? 

A. I think it is the opinion of the town of Dorchester, as a town, that the 
suppression of the sale of liquor has been a very great benefit to the town. 
I think it was manifest in the vote o^our town at our last town meeting. 

Q. In what way ? 

A. In the election of town officers notoriously known as men bound to 
enforce the law. 

Q. Do you mean that your associates in office have the same views in this 
respect ? 



APPENDIX. 679 

A . I do sir. 

Q. Your officials are substantially a unit on this subject ? 

A. They are, sir. 

Q. Do you think that the condition of things is better than if the people 
did not feel that the law could be executed ? 

A. I think we all feel that it is better. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) If it were left to the town of Dorchester to say 
whether they would permit the sale of liquor or not, which way would the 
opinion of the town go ? 

A. I have my opinion. My opinion is that the town of Dorchester would, 
with a very large majority, sustain the present law. 

Q. If you had proof, showing that there should be some modification of the 
present law, would you think it would be better to change the law than to 
retain it as it is now ? 

A. Certainly, I think it would be better. 

Q. Would it be just as well if it were done by the vote of the town or 
without it ? 

A . Very different, sir. If the vote was as I represent that it would be, 
and the town of Milton, for instance, had the privilege of selling liquors, I 
think that the town of Dorchester would be very much affected by it. 

Q. Is liquor sold freely in Milton ? 

A. Not to my knowledge. 

Q. Is it in Boston ? 

A. I think it is ; common report says that it is. 

Q. Do they ever have any difficulty in getting it in Dorchester or Boston ? 

A. I suppose not, sir. 

Q. The benefits to be derived from this law depend chiefly upon the fact 
that it excludes the persons who sell very generally ? 

A. I suppose that may be the cause. 

Q. You do not get the full benefit of the law if they sell freely in Boston ? 

A , No, sir ; I wish we could have the benefit of it. The effort to suppress 
the sale of liquor 'illegally is the object of the law, as I understand it. 

Q. Is there liquor bought and used in Dorchester ? 

A. I have no doubt that there is liquor used and liquor bought of the 
State Agency. 

Q. And used for what purposes ? For drink ? 

A. I do not suppose that either of the agents sell liquor except for medi- 
cinal or mechanical purposes. 

Q. Do people in Dorchester use liquor ? 

A. I have no doubt that there are gentlemen in Dorchester who use it. 

Q. Where do they get it ? 

A. I do not know, sir. 

Q. What is the state of facts ? Is it used in families ? 

A. I do not know that it is. I know it is not in mine, except for medicinal 
purposes. 

Q. You do not know whether it is used by any large portion of your 
people ? 

A. I do not know. 



680 APPENDIX. 

Q. There is intemperance in your direction ? 

A. We have occasionally an intemperate man in Dorchester. 

Q. How extensive it is you do not know ? 

A. I only know that the evidences of its use are far less frequent than 
they were a few years ago. 

Q. How extensive the use of liquor in such a manner as to produce intoxi- 
cation is, you do not know ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. Have, at any time within two or three years, the representatives of 
Dorchester been elected on this principle ? 

A. No, sir, not on the license law ; they were elected as Republicans. 

Q. How long ago ? 

A . That was a year ago this last fall. 

Q. Were they in favor of a license law ? 

A. I do not know, sir. 

Q. Were they in favor of the present law ? 

A. I believe not. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) But the present board of selectmen, I understand, 
were men whose opinions were well pronounced ? 

A. The present board were elected as temperance men, as men in favor 
of the enforcement of the law ; and the vote of the town, as near as my 
memory serves, was in the proportion of two to one. Mr. Fox was elected as 
a representative because he was a good man, and Mr. Pierce was a good 
working man for the town. On Mr. Fox's resignation, I was chosen quite 
unanimously. The question of temperance or intemperance did not enter 
into the election of Mr. Pierce or Mr. Fox, but it did in my case. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You are a total abstainer ? 

A. I am. 

Testimony of Rev. Joseph G. Cochran. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How long have you been missionary in Persia ? 

A. I was on the ground eighteen years. It is twenty years since we left 
this country. 

Q. At what place were you located ? 

A. In the north-western province of Persia. Our mission is among the 
Nestorians, a nominally Christian portion of that district. 

Q. Is that a grape-growing country ? 

A. It is, sir. 

Q. And a wine-making country ? 

A. It is, to a very large extent. Perhaps there are few sections where 
there is more made than in the province of Azerbijan, the north-western prov- 
ince of Persia. 

Q. Is it commonly drank among the population generally ? 

A. The use of it I had perhaps better state in a few words. 

Q. Please give your general idea. 

A. Wine is made there, a pure wine which is never sweetened. It is never 
adulterated or mixed in any way. The pure juice of the grape is deposited 
in large earthen jars or vessels, and it is closed from the air by skins that are 



APPENDIX. 681 

drawn over the mouths of these vessels, and it is left to ferment. It is never 
drank until it is fermented ; never until it becomes wine. I have never 
known the use of that which was unfermented, and that which would be anal- 
ogous to the sweet cider that is here used. I believe it is not used that way ; at 
least not to any extent. It is only intoxicating wines that are drank. And 
tliis wine, deposited in these earthen jars, becomes fermented after about two 
months, and then the jars are opened, when we have the " wine-drinking 
season," as it is called. An individual having his barrel of wine, will open it, 
and he is obliged to drink it up in the course of two or three weeks, or it will 
turn to vinegar. So he invites his neighbors — five, or six, or eight — and they 
sit with him from day to day, coming in the morning and going swaggering to 
their homes at eleven or twelve o'clock at night. They sit with him until that 
wine is drank ; then another of that circle opens his, and so it goes around in 
the circle. A whole village will be made up of these wine-drinking circles. 
The whole village of male adults will be habitually intoxicated for a month 
or six weeks. 

I speak now of places not brought under evangelical influence, and I refer 
to these villages as we found them. There is a very marked difference now. I 
remember on one occasion of asking Mar Yohannan, on his return from a certain 
village, if he had seen any intoxication there. " Intoxication ! " was his reply, 
" the very walls were reeling and swaggering." The extensiveness of intem- 
perance there is very great. I remember one instance of sitting down with the 
leading men of a village, and estimating the cost ; and this was in a village 
where some progress had been made, and the amount had been limited some- 
what. We estimated that the cost of wine in that village would be about the 
price of half a year's wages for every house: that is to say, it would be about 
the price of the wages of a man for half a year in every house in the village. 
It is, I believe, a generally received fact that wine costs more there than the 
taxes of the government and the church taxes, and the oppression of the land- 
holders added ; that is, that the cost of wine is more than the cost of all 
these put together ; and we are enabled to see the difference between the use 
of wine and the result in places where it is not used. We have a prohibitory 
law among the Mahommedans, and it is very efficient so far as Mahomme- 
danism has control over its subjects. It is a matter of superstition. Gener- 
ally, I believe, Mahommedans observe that regulation. I do not suppose a 
conscientious Mahommedan would touch intoxicating liquor in any form. 
There is a class of unbelieving Mahommedans (and that class is increasing) 
who are throwing off Mahommedan influences, and, perhaps we may say, 
becoming Christian in name. This class is increasing, and the intemperance 
is considerable. You will see a large class of these in Constantinople. You 
will see in the larger places a good deal of intemperance among the Mahom- 
medans ; but it will be these infidel Mahommedans, who have broken away 
from their religion. In the towns and villages of our province, there is no 
wine made among the Mahommedans. It is a common remark among them 
to the Christians, " You use your grapes for wine ; we use ours for molasses." 
Grapes are used in other ways very extensively ; but that is the main use to 
which they are put, the manufacture of molasses. The Christians make less 
of this and more of wine. The distinction between the Christians and the 
86 



682 APPENDIX. 

Mahomniedans, right by their side, is very marked. They are in a better 
condition, and manifestly not owing to the condition of their government 
relations. The effect, as all can see, is traceable in the use of these wines. 

Q. Are they in a worldly sense of view more prosperous ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do they use grapes to a large extent for food ? 

A. Yes, sir. To illustrate : in our small village, we lay in, in the autumn, 
two tons of grapes, which are eaten during the winter. We lay up about a 
ton of molasses, and nearly a ton of raisins, all of which are eaten as food. 
And they are eaten extensively by the people, and even by the lower class as 
food. These raisins are so abundant that the common people find that that 
kind of food is about as obtainable as others. 

Q. Do these people who drink wine to that extent profess any religion ? 

A. They are nominally Christians of the old Nestorian Church. Wine 
has been sanctioned by their priests, though of course drunkenness is con- 
demned by them — that is, theoretically. We find it very easy to produce a 
reform among them. We have a very short argument with them. We say 
that drunkenness is a sin ; and that the use of wine produces drunkenness, 
and therefore ought to be abandoned. And they come right to total absti- 
nence from the use of wine as a beverage. We have found it necessary to 
circulate temperance pledges in this way. And we find a very marked 
difference. We have villages where there was four or five times as much 
wine made thirty years ago as there is now. There are some places where 
there was formerly a large amount made every year, and where five or six 
years ago there was not a man who made any ; subsequently there was some 
made, and perhaps there may have been last year. The leading men 
controlled the matter and prevented the making of it. 

Q. Islamism is the nominal religion of Persia ? 

A. Yes, sir ; the ruling class are Mohammedans. 

Q. And there are large numbers in Turkey and in Europe ? 

A. I suppose there are some hundred and fifty millions of Mahammedans 
in Northern Africa and Western Asia. 

Q. What proportion had you supposed had become rather heretical ? 

A. I am not prepared to say. 

Q. Would you guess one-half ? 

A. No, sir. I should not suppose more than a quarter had broken quite 
away from restraints ; it may be not a quarter. 

Q. So that you have, in your judgment, considerably over a hundred 
millions who do not use wine ? 

A. So far as I know, sir. I am not informed in reference to Northern 
Africa and that region. I have no recollection of hearing any statements 
made as to that region. I know that it is a law of the Koran ; and that, in 
our section of Persia, that law is enforced by the clergy and leading class of 
Mohammedans. 

Q. And it is universally regarded by those who are regarded as the true 
followers of the prophet ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Mohammed lived about twelve centuries ago ? 



APPENDIX. 683 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is your climate there ? 

A. We have a mild climate. It is about the latitude of Southern Virginia. 
But we are in the mountains, about five thousand feet above the level of the 
sea. The summers are long, and the crops are brought forward three or four 
weeks earlier than in this State. 

Q. Have you any consumption ? 
• A. No, sir ; I think there is none. It is my general impression that there 
are no cases of adult consumption. 

Q. I have heard that there are cases of infants having consumption ? 

A. There may be some few instances of that, but they are rare. 

Q. Is not the use of goats' milk almost universal in that region ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Why I asked this is, because our friends at Harvard College describe 
whiskey as being useful in cases of consumption. I propose to introduce goats' 
milk. No man who drinks goats' milk in your country has consumption, does 

he? 

A. We do not find consumption, and we do find goats' milk. Whether 
I should put the two things together I am not prepared to say. 

Q. Those that you term real Christians, those that come under your influ- 
ence and profess to be believers, those under the influence of the missionaries, 
do they generally abstain from the use of wines ? 

A. Yes, sir, generally : that is the rule— there are some few exceptions. 
And the rule would hold to a greater extent, perhaps, than in this country. 

Q. The old Nestorians there consider it rather a nominal thing ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You say there is a marked difference between those who do not and 
those who do drink wine ? 

A . Yes, sir. But there are other evils among the Mohammedans than that. 
The polygamy of the country is disastrous in its results. But they have the 
advantage on the wine question without any doubt. 

Q. Have you noticed tho effect upon evangelical people generally ? 

A. Yes, sir ; those that educate themselves to it shorten their lives mate- 
rially. And I should state further than I did, in reference to the intemperance 
there. Those who acquire the habit of drinking wine very soon commence 
drinking a kind of whiskey that is made there, arrack or arrache, as it is called 
in some°nations of the East. The better class, those in better circumstances, 
will pass from the use of wine to the use of this arrack. They use it to excess, 
and you will see all the evils that you do in the purlieus of our cities, so far as 
it prevails. 

Q. It is referable to the use of wine ? 

A. It is, unquestionably, sir. They commence with wine and use that for 
some years, and then go to something stronger. There may be some cases 
where they commence with the brandy ; but I am acquainted with more 
instances where they have acquired the habit of drinking arrack from drinking 

wine. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) If I understood you, you said that as soon as they 
opened this wine, they had to drink it up in order to keep it from spoiling ? 



684 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. They have no means of preserving their wine ? 

A. No, sir. They make no wooden casks, and they cannot close up the 
earthen vessels easily. 

Q. The people* in these arts of life, are not very far advanced ? 

A. Oh, no, sir. They would not be ranked with many. Indiamen, nor 
with those in Africa. They are in a semi-civilized state. 

Q. How long does this drinking season continue ? 

A. I should think it would average a month and a half. There are some 
in every village that drink longer. And there are some that are able to drink 
the wine through the year. But I am speaking of the majority. 

Q. In your own work do you find any difficulty in bringing the people to 
a condition of total abstinence, any more than you do to embrace Christianity 
and other teachings ? 

A. To induce them to practice it universally, there is some difficulty ; but 
they subscribe to the doctrine. They all see the necessity of suppressing the 
evil as it exists there. 

Q. So far as those who come within your immediate instruction, whom you 
call within your own flock, have you been very successful ? 

A. Yes, sir; there is a marked change there. 

Q. This you have accomplished by what means ? By your own moral 
means of teaching and instruction ? 

A. We have not made intemperance a disciplinary thing. We have not 
been called to do it as a rule ; however if an individual who was a member 
of our communion were to get into one of these wine circles, we should dis- 
cipline such an offence as that. But what I mean is, that we have not made 
the signing of the pledge a condition of the admission to our communion. 

Q. The means which you have used have been moral means ? 

A. We have relied mainly on those, sir. 

Q. You have had no aid in that work from any law of the State or of the 
country ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you go to the State for anything ? 

A. I should not hesitate to state that, to institute any means of that kind 
to-day, the results might be unfavorable ; but if a moral sentiment existed, 
such as there is in this country, it would materially affect the question. 

Q. In the present state of things, you do not ask anything of that kind ? 

A. It would be worthless if we were to get it. 

Q. (By Mr. Sherman.) Is arrack mixed with wine ? 

A. No, sir ; I have never known of it. When wine is bottled, as it is in 
some cases, and sealed hermetically, it can be kept for years sometimes. 

Testimony of George A. Walton. 
Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are a member of the Board of Aldermen in 
your city ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is it your first year in that relation ? 
A. Yes, sir. 



APPENDIX. 685 

Q. Will you state, as briefly as you can, your opinion, and the results of 
your observation and conviction in regard to the question here at issue, and 
give the Committee any such information as you have that you deem valu- 
able '? 

A. I have been, sir, a teacher in the city of Lawrence for nearly eighteen 
years, in the public schools ; and I should say, from my observation in that 
relation, that nine-tenths of all the crime and misery of our city has resulted 
directly or indirectly from the use of alcoholic drinks. I took pains, sir, 
being notified to appear here, to look over the reports of our city marshal 
from 1862 to the present time, in order to see what the proportion of arrests 
for drunkenness was compared with those made for other crimes ; and I find 
that the proportion for the whole of this time was about fifty-two per cent, 
for drunkenness. 

Q. From what time ? 

A. From 1862 to 1867. The reports were not preserved in full, but these 
are the results of all those handed me. I also looked over the reports as to 
the relative number of arrests for drunkenness from that time to the present. 
I should say instead of 1862, that it was from 1863. I find that the per cent, 
of arrests in 1863 in the city of Lawrence was sixty ; in 1864, it was fifty- 
five ; in 1865, it was fifty-two ; in 1866, it was fifty-five ; and the present year 
it was fifty per cent. This shows a constant decrease in the per cent, of 
arrests from 1863 to 1867, with the exception of the year 1866, when we had 
fifty-five per cent. These, I should state, were for the first three months, that 
is, the first quarter of these years. I did not select these because they were 
any more favorable to this view than any other period, but because I wanted 
to compare former years with the present year ; and this year would only 
bring it down to the fifteenth of the present month. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Have you the percentage for each year ? 

A. I have the percentage for a portion of the years. The percentage for 
1863 was sixty-five ; for 1864, fifty-one ; for 1865, forty-seven ; for 1866, fifty- 
six. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Are there any other statements which you would 
like to make ? 

A . It seems to me that the tendency of our system of regulation is to 
induce our officers to carry out the law more fully. Our city marshal and 
assistant-marshal receive a salary ; and beside that salary they have been in 
the habit of receiving fees in case of these arrests. Now, if they bring up 
men for any offence, they secure a fee of, we will say, something like two dol- 
lars and a half for each case. The question would be, if the number of cases 
had increased, whether there would not be, in an efficient officer, especially if 
he looked to these emoluments, an inclination on his part, as ordinances are, 
to increase the number of cases which he would bring in. 

Q. What is your opinion touching the desirableness of preserving the 
existing prohibitory Is 



aw 



A. I have no doubt, sir, that it is desirable to preserve it, and to improve 
it, if we can. 

Q. You have entire confidence in the practicability of its execution in 
your city ? 



686 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir ; I have no doubt that it can be executed as far as other laws 
are executed in the city. 

Q. Do you or not think that the execution of it would tend to the execu- 
tion of other laws and lessen crime ? 

A. I certainly think so. 

Q. Have you knowledge of the influence upon the other laws ? Do you 
think there would be evils growing out of the influence of this law upon other 
laws? 

A. No, sir ; my conviction is that it would be the other way. 

Q. Do you feel that it would dampen the spirits of good moral men in your 
town ? 

A. I think our moral efforts are very much increased by the prohibitory 
law ; and that our temperance men work, since the appointment of the State 
Police, with their moral means more earnestly than they did before. And it 
seems to me reasonable that that should be so. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Have you not got the percentage from 1860 ? You 
took an average of fifty-two per cent. ? 

A. I took it from 1863. 

Q. You stated that the average was fifty-two per cent. ? 

A. I stated at first that it was 1862, but it was 1863. 

Q. By that it appears that the number of arrests last year was greater 
than the average ? 

A. Yes, sir ; in the total, and in the whole period of the year. 

Q. Then there was some drunkenness last year, so far as these returns 
go, and so far as your testimony goes ? 

A. That seems to be the natural inference. 

Q. And at the same time were there during the last few years, and up to 
1867 any open places of sale in Lawrence ? 

A. I never saw of myself, that I know of, a single glass of liquor sold in 
Lawrence. I have not been in the habit of going into those places where 
liquor was sold. 

Q. There were no open, visible places where liquor was sold there ? 

A. Yes, sir; I should say that sometimes I could have gone about our 
city, and have said, from what was visible, that there were fifty places that 
could be designated, any time within the last fifteen years. 

Q. Last year I am talking about. 

A. During the last year, I should say that I had seen barrels of what was 
apparently liquor about the cellars and groggeries. 

Q. I was only inquiring as to the open sale when you stated that there 
was no open sale, and there was. 

A. I did not so state. 

Q. Then there are open places of sale, and have been during the last 
year? 

A. I say about that, that I never have seen any liquor sold in Lawrence ; 
so that I cannot say absolutely about that. 

Q. Then I would inquire whether the operations of the State Constable 
during 1866 and 1867 have really closed the places where liquor is sold 
in Lawrence ? 



APPENDIX. 687 

A. Well, sir ; I can only go by hearsay. 

Q. Have you seen anything in your own observation to induce you to 
suppose that he did not close them all ? 

A. I have seen casks of liquor going through our streets (I should say 
liquor), within a few days. 

Q. Has the operation of the State Constables, during the year 1866, 
closed the open sale of liquor in Lawrence ? 

A . I should say that it had undoubtedly curtailed the sales to a very great 
extent. 

Q. But you will not say that it has closed the retail business ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. And you will say that, in the last year, there has been more drunken- 
ness, so far as you have got information, and from 1863 to the present time ? 

A. I should say, from my own observation, that drunkenness had dimin- 
ished to a very great extent. 

Q. But yet the number of arrests were greater during that year than 
during any other year. 

A. No, sir ; not- than any other. 

Q. What was the number of arrests in 1863 ? 

A. The number of arrests I cannot give you, sir. I have not observed 
any further than the percentage which I drew off. 

Q. Can you tell the number t)f arrests in 1864 ? Have you got them ? 

A. No, sir ; I have not any of those. 

Q. Have you given them in 1866 ? 

A . No, sir ; I have none of the totals, but the percentage. 

Q. You are unable to tell how many arrests there were. 

A. I had the notes, but I have not got them. I could tell pretty near, I 
should say that the total number of arrests for last year was three hundred. 

Q. The total number of arrests was greater than any year previously. 
Have you got any statements ? 

A . No, sir ; I have not. 

Q. Are you at all prepared to contradict the correctness of the statements 
which have been made on this point ? 

A. No, sir, I am not. 

Q. Where does this liquor come from which you see carted through the 
streets ? By what agency is it brought there ? 

A. I suppose it comes over our railroad. 

Q. The express does a large business at it ? 

A. It is carried, I should say, over the railroad (I am merely guessing at 
this, however, sir), and carried by our teamsters. 

Q. Where do the barrels go to ? Into stores, to be retailed, or into 
families, to be consumed by the families ? 

A. This being in casks, which I refer to, I should say that it was more 
likely to go into the stores. 

Q. And there they are retailed, I suppose. Any doubt About it ? 

A. I have no reason to doubt it. 

Q. Are there quite a large number of kegs and demijohns and jugs 
brought in in that way ? 



688 APPENDIX. 

A. I have not understood about that. 

Q. Does it make any difference, in your opinion, whether the people buy 
the liquor and send it over the road or buy it at the stores ? 

A. My own feeling is, from observation, in Lawrence, that if we could save 
the young people there in town from the liquor which is exposed . to view, by 
which they are tempted and begin to drink, we should save effectually a large 
part of this class of persons who have never learned to drink ; and if they 
never find it except in families, the families of this class of persons would not 
be very likely to use the liquor ; so that it would be an advantage to have it 
in the families rather than in the shops. 

Q. Do you understand that clubs have been organized in Lawrence, where 
persons have a common stock of liquors of various kinds, and go and drink it 
as they please ? 

A. I do not know that there is. 

Q. Have you never understood that such is the fact ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You have not heard anything about it ? 

A. No, sir ; not until a witness testified so from Lynn to-day. 

Q. Should you be apt to know it if it did exist ? 

A. It might exist without my knowing it. 

Testimony of Rev. George P. Wilson. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you reside in Lawrence ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are city missionary there ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I should like to know what your observation in that position has been, 
and what conclusion that has brought you to in regard to the question between 
the prohibitory law and a license law ? 

A. I have been city missionary now eight years, and chaplain of the jail 
some seven years. All the time from the commencement, my attention has 
been brought to the effects of intemperance, by seeing the poverty, distress 
and crime arising from it. And I have this very sincere conviction, that the 
prohibitory law has helped the temperance sentiment and the temperance 
people of our city. During the first three years of the war, intemperance 
largely increased. In our city and in the places about us, the cause of this 
was very largely from the war, and for the reason that the temperance people 
who were drawn to supply the soldiers in the field, and the agitation of the 
temperance question ceased almost entirely. Intemperance increased until 
some two years and a half ago, when the subject was brought up in public 
meetings, and since that time public meetings have been held once a fort- 
night in the churches and public halls, and the temperance sentiment has 
increased, and the sentiment in favor of a prohibitory law has increased, so 
far as my observation goes, and I have had some considerable experience in 
this matter, and in the work that has been going on. I have thought, and 
other people have remarked, that the temperance principle was helped very 
largely by the law. There is less intemperance to-day in Lawrence, from this 
fact. There are many who were known to drink, who now do not drink at 



APPENDIX. 689 

all, consequently there is less drank, so far as' they are concerned. I have 
reason to know that all the active temperance men in Lawrence would con- 
sider it the greatest calamity that could happen to them, to pass a license 
law. There is a petition now in circulation among the legal voters, remon- 
strating against the passage of such a law. And the wives and children of 
those who drink implore the legal voters that there shall not be a power to 
license the sale. I have had this presented to me time and again by those 
who suffer. There has also been a petition circulated among the ladies, and 
a very large number of them have signed that petition. I think that if the 
sale was legalized and made respectable, many men who have joined our 
temperance societies would be lured to drink ; and I also believe that there is 
no safe position but total abstinence from intoxicating drink as a beverage. 

Q. What is the population of Lawrence ? 

A. About ten thousand. 

Q. How long have you resided in Lawrence ? 

A. Some fifteen years. For ten years I know of no prominent or open 
temperance man that has changed his views or opinion of the license law. I 
do know men, who signed a petition last year for a license law, who have 
signed a petition in remonstrance this year, having changed their opinion 
within a year. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) There is intemperance in Lawrence now> I suppose ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is there any open sale in Lawrence ? 

A. I think there is no public sale. I think it would be very difficult for a 
stranger to get strong liquor in Lawrence. 

Q. If he understood the way he could get it, could he not ? 

A. I have no doubt that the initiated could. 

Q. Are there more secret places of sale ? 

A . I think there are less secret places and less sale. 

Q. Is there more liquor sold ? 

A. Liquor has not been very openly sold. It has been a matter of con- 
cealment generally. 

Q. Has there not been a statement made in regard to the number of 
arrests ? 

A. It may seem a strange fact, but I think that the temperance meetings 
had something to do with that matter. It was very easy, sometimes, to lead 
persons home, when they might have been taken and locked up. 

Q. Will any law operate effectually without moral means to support it ? 

A. Not entirely, sir; until we get another generation. 

Q. Do you think you can educate the people up to that standard ? 

A. We have got about a thousand boys and girls in the Band of Hope. 

Q. Will it not, after all, depend very much on the usages, and the 
temptations, and the moral sense and the moral standard of the community ? 

A. I think so, sir ; and for that reason I hope there will be no license to 
sell that they may be tempted. 

Q. Which is the worse,. to sell openly or to sell secretly ? 
87 



690 APPENDIX. 

A. I think that the effect on the community is very much worse to sell 
while we have a law against it. It is then considered a crime by a very 
large number of good people. 

Q. Are there not a large number of people who buy liquor who are 
respectable men in which the sale to them is a crime ? 

A. Not a large number. There are some who are very good citizens, and 
in every other way reliable men. 

Q. Is there any effect upon the moral force of a law, in your judgment, 
where it is not regarded as a wrong to violate it ? 

A. I do not know that it is any more so than any criminal law. 

Q. In any criminal law, do you think it would have an injurious effect 
produced by the open violation of it ? 

A. It may be so. 

Q. This no more than any other ? Nevertheless it is true that it is quite 
undesirable that this law should be violated by that class of people ? 

A. I think so, certainly. 

Q. Is not the influence worse than if they purchased this liquor under the 
permission of the law ? 

A. A very large majority of those who would purchase this liquor, if it 
was licensed, do not dare to buy it now, and do not buy it. 

Q. How extensive do you know that to be so ? 

A. From what I know of persons, and of the inability to get it in what 
they would call respectable places. 

Q. You suppose that they are kept from it because there are no respec- 
table places ? 

A. I suppose so, sir. 

Q. Would that account for sending down to Boston to get it ? 

A. I suppose there are some, sir. 

Q. Is the influence bad upon the cause of temperance in that way ? 

A. Perhaps so. The reason that we cannot enforce the law with us is, 
because it is not enforced in Boston. 

Q. Have you noticed what has been stated by other witnesses, as to liquors 
in barrels and casks being brought into the city by expressmen ? 

A. There is quite a quantity of beer brought in. 

Q. The quantity, is that very great ? 

A. Not so much as in former years. 

Q. How do you make that statement ? 

A. By inquiring at the depot. 

Q. Do you get from the depot any exact statement as to the amount ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Did they tell you how much it had fallen off? 

A. No, sir; only that there was considerably less brought in during the 
last eighteen months. 

Q. (By Mr. Sherman.) Supposing the sales were stopped in Boston ; 
would not the Lawrence people supply themselves from Manchester ? 

A. Possibly they might ; but I do not think they would to the extent that 
they do now. There is comparatively little business done between the two 
places. 



APPENDIX. 691 

Q. It would be possible for people to send there V 

A. Yes, sir; I do not know why they should not go there just as well as 
anywhere. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you suppose that there is any way that, if peo- 
ple desire to drink liquor, they will not get it ? 

A. I have some experience in suppressing it at Lawrence, and have talked 
temperance, and obtained pledges ; and I do not think that some of them 
would drink unless they knew they could be certain that it could be obtained 
in certain places. . 

Q. Do you think it would entirely stop the purchasing of liquor ? 

A. I do not think it would be entirely stopped. I presume some would 
send to New York or to San Francisco, if need be, for it. 

Q. Is there any distillation ? How is that to be prevented ? 

A. By the sharp eyes of the State Constable. 

Q. The liquor being in the country, I suppose no one expects to exclude 
it. Half of it is used in the arts, and gets into the hands of the people. 
Now do you suppose any kind of a law is going to prevent these persons from 
getting it ? 

A. Not entirely. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) You stated that the influence of the agitation by 
the temperance men might have an influence on the number of arrests ? 

A, Yes, sir. 

Q. Then do you think the number of arrests necessarily indicates the 
amount of drunkenness ? 

A. No, sir, not necessarily. I might state that a large number of our 
people have been in favor of a license law, and I presume that a large num- 
ber have been brought into court as evidence that drunkenness was increas- 
ing. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You have been asked if some persons with strong 
appetites might not send to New Hampshire to get their liquor, if they could 
not get it in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q, You are aware that New Hampshire is looking with great interest to 
Massachusetts to see what she will do in executing the law. Do you see any 
more difficulty in closing the sale in Manchester than in Lawrence ? 

A. No, sir. 

Testimony of John I. Baker. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Will you be kind enough to state your present 
place of business ? 

A. At 22 Custom-House Street, in this city. 

Q. You are the State Liquor Agent ? 

A. Sometimes called agent ; I am the State Liquor Commissioner. 

Q. Did you seek your place or was it tendered to you, with an urgent 
solicitation to accept it ? 

A . I certainly did not seek the appointment. I declined accepting it for 
a great while, but was urged very strongly by men to whom I eventually 
deferred. 



692 APPENDIX. 

Q. Who gave you this appointment ? 

A . Governor Bullock. 

Q. Had the late governor tendered you any place of responsibility ? 

A . I held at the time the position of Inspector of Fish in this city, which 
I resigned and took this appointment. That was an office quite as agreeable 
and quite as lucrative as this. 

Q. Were either of these places presented to you on account of any especial 
knowledge that you had of either fish or liquors ? 

A. I had no special knowledge upon either subject. 

Q, You speak of the relative remuneration of the two places. Without 
going into the subject of remuneration, will you be kind enough to state what 
may be of interest of the operation of the Liquor Agency under your charge ? 

A. My printed report, which the Committee undoubtedly have seen, 
shows a net profit or apparent profit of two thousand dollars between the 10th 
of July and the 1st of October. I followed copying in making out that 
report. I had been in the Agency for such a short time I had no experience 
in the matter, and I made up my report as it had been made up heretofore. 
I charged nothing for interest, nothing for waste or leakage or evaporation, 
which is very large. In January I took an account of stock. 

Q. Do you mean to say January instead of October ? 

^4. My account was made up in October according to the law. In Janu- 
ary I took an account of stock by which it appeared that the waste from those 
sources was something over three thousand dollars, and that the interest 
account up to that time would have been a thousand and odd dollars, which 
taken with my expense account from my commissions amount to a little less 
than fifteen hundred from the 10th of July to the 1st of January. I ought to 
say that in my expense account I charged for furniture for office, amounting, 
perhaps, to eight or nine hundred dollars. 

Q. Will you now briefly state what is your method of procedure in 
discharging your duties of State Liquor Commissioner ? 

A. When I came into the office, desiring to administer it in the light of 
the law, and to get the best concern I could to get my liquors from, I availed 
myself of my previous knowledge of the traffic in this city, which was not 
very limited, as I had had the privilege of serving upon committees of this 
Legislature for several years when this matter had been a subject of legisla- 
tion. In 1852 I was appointed upon a committee of this Legislature that 
reported the first prohibitory law. In 1856 1 was appointed upon a committee 
that was investigating the manner in which the law was carried into operation. 
Complaint was then made by liquor-houses in this city of the same nature 
that are now made in regard to the Agency, and the result of the investiga- 
tion of that committee satisfied me that those liquor-houses that made the 
complaints and appeared here and testified, from the character of the testi- 
mony and from their mode of procedure in the matter, were such that they 
ought not to be trusted. Therefore, in getting my supply of liquor, I did not 
go to those houses. 

Q. Will you state as fully as you feel warranted in doing the facts 
pertaining to that matter ? 



APPENDIX. 693 

A . I may not recollect the particulars. I will only speak of the impression 
left upon my mind by that investigation. Mr. Williams was one of the 
witnesses. Complaint was made in regard to his house and also against Mr. 
Richards' house. 

Q. When was this ? 

.A. In 1856 ; the complaint was in regard to the quality and price of 
brandy furnished to the State Agency. During that investigation a printed 
circular was produced from the house of Messrs. Richards, offering brandy at 
a much less rate than that paid by the Agency. Complaint had been made 
by the Agent that that quality of brandy could not be furnished at that price, 
and this circular was printed by the liquor-houses which offered to furnish to 
their customers brandy of the same quality as that furnished by the Agency 
at a much less rate. I cannot speak definitely of the facts, but that is the 
impression left upon my mind. 

Q. Do you think of any other houses that were involved in that testimony ? 

A. I can recall to mind but those two. 

Q. You were satisfied from the revelations made in regard to those houses 
that the quality of liquor which was furnished, and the transactions into 
which they had entered, did not warrant you in going to them ? 

A. That was my impression, and subsequent matters rather tended to 
confirm that impression. I then inquired, both of temperance friends and 
others, in regard to what houses it would be better to obtain a supply. I 
ought to state that I had no capital to put into this business. My means were 
very limited indeed. All that I had to put into it was character. I inquired 
of my friends, and they universally joined in recommending Foster & Taylor. 
It had been my privilege to know Mr. Foster formerly. I boarded at the 
same house with him years ago, and formed a very pleasant acquaintance 
with him. I had entertained a very favorable opinion of him ever since. I 
was informed that his was the only liquor-house in town that conformed sub- 
stantially to the requirements of the law. They do not break packages and 
sell contrary to the law. That gave me confidence in the house, and I went 
to tliem and made arrangements with them whereby I could buy of them in 
their line of trade, which is the foreign liquors principally, and the whiskeys. 

Q. Having supplied yourself with your stock of liquors, what was your 
procedure ? 

A. I will state also that I supplied myself with new rum, almost entirely 
from Lawrence & Son, whose rum, so far as I can learn, is the best in the 
market. Their rum runs remarkably uniform and pure, and hardly varies at 
all upon analysis, and my customers invariably call for that, although there 
are exceptions where men desire some chaper article. My alcohol I procured 
from Graves & Co. When I make any purchases, before concluding the 
agreement, I look around and see the article I want, and then I send to the 
State Assayer and have him come and take samples from the cask or packages 
in which it is contained, and under a chemical analysis. He takes those 
samples, and returns to me a written analysis in every case, and no article is 
accepted unless he certifies it to be pure in every particular. Unless this 
certificate is that the article is pure, it is not accepted nor used. 



694 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) You say that you require the State Assayer to 
certify to you that the liquors you are about to purchase are pure ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What assurance have you after you get that analysis, that you get these 
liquors that have been analyzed ? What chances are there for the company to 
palm off upon you other liquors than those answering to your analysis? 
What means have you of knowing that you get the liquors analyzed ? 

Q. A good many of the liquors are delivered to my place before they are 
analyzed. Certain kinds of liquors are almost uniformly alike. Samples of 
them for analysis are taken from the packages at my store ; other samples are 
taken from packages either from the bonded ware-house or at the store of the 
parties. My experience in this, as in every business, is, that I have to trust 
somebody. It is impossible to do business without trusting them. 

Q. Do the liquors, after you get them into your possession, undergo any 
change or modificatiou ? Do you do anything to change their character or 
quality ? 

A . Nothing, excepting in a case of this kind : cider-brandy, for instance, 
which is used for bathing, comes in at a higher grade than pure. If there are 
thirty gallons of the liquid which, by reducing, would make fifty gallons of the 
ordinary grade, when I buy it I pay for the fifty gallons and afterwards 
reduce it. 

Q. Reduce it by adding what ? 

A . By adding water. 

Q. Nothing else ? 

A. Nothing else. That is the only knowledge that I have of any addition 
to any article. 

Q. Is there any other person connected with the Agency whose compensa- 
tion for services performed depends upon the profits made ? 

A. None at all. They all have specified salaries. 

Q. So that no agent or employee of yours has any pecuniary temptation 
to change or modify or cheapen the liquor ? 

A. No, sir. And I do not think that they have any opportunity to do so. 
It would be impossible for any one to do it without collusion with the others. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) It is testified here by the agent from Hadley, 
Mass., if I remember rightly, that liquors from your agency were bad. Do 
you remember whether the agent from Hadley purchases of you ? 

A. He purchases of me to some extent, but I read somewhere in one of 
the papers (the newspapers do not always report the testimony alike), that he 
testified as to purchasing brandy of me at a certain price. My impression is, 
that he was incorrect in that statement. One paper reported him as buying 
brandy for $6.50 per gallon. He has bought no brandy of me at all at that 
price. I have copies of the bills here, and he has bought of me Medford 
rum, St. Croix rum, Bourbon whiskey, alcohol and Honeysuckle gin, and 
some brandy. He bought brandy as high as $10 per gallon, but none at $6 
or $6.50. If such was his testimony, it is incorrect. Here are the items of 
what he has purchased [producing papers]. I have never heard of any com- 
plaints from him in regard to the matter. In all instances, where complaints 
have reached me, I have written immediately to the parties to give me the 



APPENDIX. 695 

cause of complaint, to send me samples of liquor, or have them analyzed 
themselves at my expense, and give me all the information they could, as I 
was desirous to know if there was anything wrong about it. I have never 
found any complaint supported. 

Q. Did you learn anything adverse to the Agency by the inquiries of the 
committee of which you spoke of having been a member in 1856, or were the 
investigations of the committee for another purpose ? 

A. I forget the exact question before the committee ; but I remember it 
covered an examination of' the character of the Agency. Last year I was 
upon the Committee of Investigation in regard to Mr. Porter's agency. 

Q. And what did you find ? 

A. The result of that investigation was such that I said when I went into 
this office, that if I could come out of it with as clean a record as Mr. Porter, 
I should be satisfied. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What is the amount of business in the course of the 
year at the State Liquor Agency ? 

A . The amount of my sales, I should think, would average about a thou- 
sand dollars per day, since I have been in office. 

Q. Do you include Sundays in that estimate ? 

A . I should say the sales were about $300,000 per year. 

Q. To whom do you sell ? 

A . To the city and town agents. 

Q. Do you carry on the business at all of furnishing by the pint or small 
measure ? 

A . I do not, sir. I think if the city authorities of Boston would exercise 
the right they have under the law to appoint an agent in the city of Boston, 
the people would have a chance to know whether the law is administered 
here or not. They have always, however, declined to do so. The statute 
provides that the Commissioner may appoint agents in the city of Boston, not 
exceeding five in number. I have been endeavoring to find the right man to 
take the agency, that the people might have an opportunity to test the admin- 
istration of the office. Lately Mr. Reed applied to me to see if I would find 
him any business. He seemed to me to be the right man for the agency, but 
he has been unable yet to succeed in getting any place in town ; but inas- 
much as I have had frequent calls from gentlemen who said that they wished 
to buy in accordance with the law, I have appointed him as agent, and he 
sells at my place of business. 

Q. How long since that appointment has been made ? 

A. About two months. 

Q. Up to that time, then, has there been any city agency, so far as you 
know ? 

A. Mr. Porter had a nominal agency there, but I guess the public were 
not aware of it. There was not much liquor sold. 

Q. Have there ever been any agents appointed by the city government ? 

A. There have been none appointed by the Mayor and Aldermen since 
the law took effect, to my knowledge. 

Q. Then has the State Agency ever availed itself of its power to appoint 
an agent in this city until you attempted it ? 



696 APPENDIX. 

A. Mr. Porter had a special agent in East Boston. 

Q. But none in Boston ? 

A. None except a nominal one at his place of business that I am 
aware of. 

Q. Did Mr. Porter's agent sell much ? 

A. No, sir. He did a very limited business. 

Q. Then, as a matter of fact, for the last fifteen years, there has been 
under this law any place where liquor could be obtained for medicinal pur- 
poses in Boston ? 

A. I think not. I think the public did not know that Mr. Porter had any 
special agent there to sell. 

Q. How long was he there ? 

A. I think that he was appointed in 1859, and was there six or seven 
years. 

Q. But it was never known to the public that there was a place at which 
liquor could be procured ? 

A . I think not ; that is my impression. 

Q. Are the persons in your employ paid by salary from the State ? 

A. No, sir. My pay is by commission. I have no salary, but I pay them 
a fixed salary, which is charged to the expense account. 

Q. And that which is paid to them, does not come out of the commission ? 

A. It is a part of my commission. 

Q. Then the whole expense of the Agency clerks and sub-agents is to be 
paid from the commission ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I am desirous of testing the system. I wish to put you upon your 
guard, and to state that I do not impugn anything of you in any shape or 
form. As a part of the system, as the law stands, the Commissioner is to have 
entire control of this business. He is to buy the liquor, to employ all the men 
or the help that is necessary, and all his sub-agents and expenses incurred are 
to be paid out of the commission ? 

A. The sub-agents, of course, have the right to fix the rate of profit at 
which they will sell. There is no limit in that respect. I am limited in my 
commissions. 

Q. I used the wrong word ; I did not mean sub-agents. The law pro- 
vides, does it not, that the State Agent must buy his liquor and employ his 
help, and get his compensation out of the commissions ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now again, with the same caution, is not the system a bad one in 
regard to the administration of this Agency in that way ; according to your 
opinion (and I know you will give it freely), is not that a bad policy? Is 
there not a temptation to increase the aggregate amount of the commission to 
one who is desirous of making money ? 

A. ' Yes, sir; looking at it in a mere pecuniary light, there is a temptation 
in all business. 

Q, Is there not a strong temptation to the Commissioner, however upright 
and honest he may be, in order that his own personal compensation may be 
increased to employ as cheap help in the Agency as he can get ? 



APPENDIX. 697 

A. If that were his only motive, he might be so tempted. 

Q. Is there not, therefore, a strong pecuniary inducement to a man who 
holds the place to employ incompetent and cheap help ? 

A . If he were looking at it simply as a question of interest, undoubtedly 
there is. 

Q. Is there not a liability that he may get men in the Agency that are not 
sufficiently upright in character and standing to administer its affairs hon- 
estly ? 

A. There might be, but the temptation is in another direction. If a man 
wanted to continue in the office long, he would want to employ competent 
and honest help, and so administer the business as to demand a confidence 
that would enable him to keep the office. 

Q. Is there not, then, that in the system which, if a man looks to his own 
compensation, would induce him to cheapen the expense of the Agency ? 

A. I have answered you before. Very likely there is. 

Q How many persons are employed in the Agency ? 

A. I employ, permanently, four; temporarily, or nearly all the time, 
another one, — from four to five in all. 

Q. If the law was entirely enforced, and the druggists obtained all their 
alcoholic preparations there, how much do you suppose it would increase the 
amount of the business of the Agency ? 

A. My impression is that the enforcement of the law generally would not 
increase the business anything like what people calculate. My impression is 
that the law does have an effect upon the drinking habits of the people. 
There would be less use for alcohol for medicine. 

Q. Do any of the druggists, as such, buy of you at present ? 

A . No, sir. They have no authority to buy of me, or to sell it, if they 
did buy of me. 

Q. Have druggists throughout the Commonwealth no authority to buy of 
you? 

A. Not unless they are county or town agents. 

Q. The question that I desire to ask you is, that if the business was greatly 
increased, it would not require a proportionate increase of help ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Now, must it not be, from the nature of the case, that these persons 
in the employment of the Commissioner, have access to the liquors ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And have a chance to get at it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. It is impossible, I suppose, to carry on the business without it ? 

A. I would not carry it on unless they had access to it, and I had men 
there in whom I had confidence, and to whom I was willing to give access. 

Q. Then, in your judgment, do you consider the system to be sound in 
principle ? Would it not be better, in your opinion, if there was a fixed 
salary paid by the State to every man employed ? 

A. I have advocated that amendment some time ago. I desired that the 
State should furnish the capital, and the Agent be paid a salary ; then the 
State would reap the benefit of the law, and the State force could drive the 
88 



698 APPENDIX. 

trade there. As yet, however, I have not seen any evil result from the pres- 
ent system. It may be honestly administered by an honest man. 

Q. The imported liquors, I understand you, are purchased by yourself at 
Foster & Taylor's. Have they always dqne the business of the liquor agency 
in Boston '? 

A. My impression is that they have substantially furnished the liquors ; 
they have so far as I have any knowledge. 

Q. Will you state the amount of your trade with them per year ? 

A. I have been there only eight months, so that I cannot say. 

Q. About how much per year should you say ? 

A. I think perhaps one-half of my trade is with them; probably to the 
amount of $150,000 per year. 

Q. As so large a portion of your purchases are made from them, you mean 
to buy of them as low as the market prices ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you succeed in getting liquor as low as the same article could be 
bought elsewhere ? 

A. I have no doubt, that with the exception of new rum, which customers can 
procure from the manufacturers quite as cheaply as they sell it to me, that the 
articles I sell, adding my commissions, are sold at a less price than articles of 
the same quality can be bought from other parties. 

Q. You feel it very important, I suppose, to drive as good a bargain with 
them as you can ? 

A. Certainly. My first idea is to be sure of getting a good liquor, and 
then buy as low as I can for the quality. 

Q. As to the quality of the article, you rely entirely upon the statement 
of the Assayer ? 

A. Yes, sir. I am no judge of the quality. 

Q. Your reliance is then entirely upon this Assayer ? 

A. Yes, sir, excepting the confidence I place in the parties who sell to me. 
The analysis of the State Assayer is the test that the law furnishes to me. 

Q. When you buy of one party to the amount of $150,000 a year, and he 
goes on year after year with this selling to you, and it gets to be a common 
business, he having the whole trade, there being no competition, is there not, 
from the very nature of the system, and the mode of doing business, a strong 
inducement upon the part of the house furnishing the liquor, to furnish a 
cheap article, and thereby increase the profit ? 

A. I think that, if they could have the assurance that they could furnish 
a cheap article at a large profit, and continue to receive the custom, that it 
might be a temptation to do so. But I look at the matter in a different light. 
If I was the party selling, I should deem it important to keep up the standard, 
and thus insure a permanent trade. 

Q. Is it not the ordinary custom of large business men in the country who 
deal to the amount of a hundred and fifty or two hundred thousand dollars a 
year, to select a particular house, and continue their trade with them for a 
series of years ? 



APPENDIX. 699 

A. I think thers is a difference among men in regard to that. I know of 
some men who have confined their custom to one house ever since I can 
remember. 

Q. Is there not in the very nature of that mode of conducting business a 
great liability, if men are disposed, to look after their own interest, and be a 
little sharp to pursue such a course as will increase their profits ; and is not 
the door open for them to do so ? 

A. Of course there is an opportunity for so doing, if they choose to do so. 
There is no trouble in cheating, if a man wants to cheat. 

Q. Is your reliance for advice and counsel upon persons who are interested 
in the preservation and enforcement of this law, or do you consult with other 
parties ? 

A. I do not consult with those who sell to violate the law, unless it be to ' 
gain some particular information. I ask, for information, what house in 
Boston can supply the agency with what it needs ? Has such a house char- 
acter and standing here, and does it seek to obey the State law ? Those 
are the inquiries that I make. 

Q. Of course, you would not take advice any further than to get informa- 
tion ; but that information is derived from those quarters ? 

A. And from other quarters also. 

Q. You would not go to other liquor-dealers — you would not trust them ? 

A. I have asked information of other liquor-dealers in regard to the house 
with which I am now dealing, and the uniform testimony is to their credit. 

Q. Do you know that this house has been in the habit, ever since the 
existence of the State Agency, of making an annual contribution of funds to 
an organization of the State and for the support of the temperance paper ? 

A. I never knew them to contribute a dollar to either the State temper- 
ance paper or the State Temperance Alliance. 

Q. Do you know that they did not ? 

A. I do not know that they did, neither do I know that they did not. 

Q. Do you really believe that a system like this, (with a temptation to the 
agents, through their interest, to corrupt the liquor,) can be honestly adminis- 
tered, according to the true intent and spirit of the law ? 

A. I do not see why it cannot be. I have not yet seen any reason why it 
cannot be. 

Q. You are aware, I suppose, that in case of sickness it is customary for 
physicians to estimate the value of the liquor used from its age ? The price 
of liquor varies greatly, according to its age, does it not ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Is there any means by which the State Assayer can tell anything about 
the age of liquor by any analysis that he makes ? 

A . He can, of course, answer that question better than I can ; but my 
opinion is that he can. He may not be able to tell the precise number of years ; 
but I think he can tell the difference between new and old whiskey. I do 
not know ; but he is here and can answer for himself in regard to that matter. 

Q. What is your percentage ? 

A. Five per cent, on the unbroken packages ; seven and a half per cent, 
on broken packages. 



700 APPL.NJiX. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) You say the Mayor and Aldermen of Boston 
have never appointed an agent ? 

A. Never to my knowledge, 

Q. The law says that they shall do it, and yet they have never done it ? 

A. Not to my knowledge. 

Q. How mueh of the liquor sold at the Agency is alcohol ? 

A. I think forty thousand dollars worth. 

Q. The great proportion of what you purchase is analyzed from small 
samples taken from the store ? 

A. Yes, sir. The State Assayer is here and can give you particulars of 
the analysis. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How is the State Assayer paid ? 

A. He is paid one per cent, commission on the sales ; " not exceeding one 
per cent." the statute says. 

Q. Then if the sales amount to three hundred thousand dollars he will 
have three thousand dollars ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is that a good system which makes the salary of the Assayer depend 
upon the amount of sales ? 

A. I take it, that for services of this kind the amount paid must be in 
proportion to the amount of service rendered. 

Q. As a matter of fact, the certificate of the Assayer secures the sale of 
the liquor, does it not ? • 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The object of the law in creating the office was to secure a perfectly 
harmless and pure liquor for sale ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Is it wise to make the compensation of the Assayer depend upon the 
amount of sale ? 

A. If I had confidence in a man I would as soon pay him in that way as 
in any other. 

Q. Sometimes men are deceived. 

A. But you must put confidence in somebody. 

Q. But ought you not to have a perfect system that would relieve the 
State as much as possible from trusting ? 

A. I think that a man who could be tempted would be tempted as much 
under one system as under another. 

Q. Suppose the Assayer had a salary of three thousand dollars per year, 
not depending at all upon the amount of liquor sold, he would then have no 
interest in giving a certificate upon liquor examined. The Assayer comes 
into your office and assays twenty thousand dollars worth of brandy. His 
compensation, I understand you, depends upon the sale of that brandy here- 
after? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And his certificate is the letter of introduction of that article into the 
community ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



APPENDIX. 701 

Q. Has he not a direct interest in giving that brandy such a character' as 
will secure its sale and his own compensation ? 

A. He may have. 

Q. And if the lot assayed turned out to be good for nothing, he would get 
nothing for assaying it ? 

A. He would reject it then. 

Q. If every lot of liquor that he accepts is sold, he gets a compensation ; 
and for every lot that he condems he gets no compensation ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you ever take samples of a given article from every cask which 
contains it ? 

A. As a rule we do. But there are certain articles where it is not neces- 
sary. I am not sure whether he does or not in every case. In ten barrels of 
Lawrence's rum, for instance, he might make an assay every week and the 
result would be uniformly the same. Perhaps in such a case he does not take 
from every barrel, but except in the case of some liquor as well established as 
that, he takes from every barrel or package a sample. 

Q. How is it in regard to brandy ? 

A. I think that I have taken but one lot of brandy since I have been in 
the office. I found considerable brandy on hand. I have had but one 
package, and he assayed from that directly. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Some persons may infer the quantity of liquor sold 
from the total value of your sales. How does the cost of a barrel of rum, for 
instance, compare with the former prices ? 

A, It is now $2.50 per gallon ; formerly it was forty cents. 

Testimony of Dk. Augustus A. Hayes. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Is your residence in Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Where is your place of business ? 

A. No. 20 State Street. 

Q. You are the State Assayer ? 

A. I have held that office since it was created. 

Q. Will you state, as briefly and as clearly as you can, the method of your 
duties, and their relation to the question before us ? 

A. As State Assayer, I am called upon to perform the duties connected 
with the analysis of the spirits of all kinds sold or distributed at the office of 
the State Commissioner. In attending to that duty, I have constantly, since 
I was appointed, drawn my samples from the liquors either at the store of the 
Agency or at the warehouse, either the Custom House warehouse, or the 
warehouse of Foster & Taylor. Those samples have been subjected to careful 
chemical analysis, and the quality of the liquor stated briefly to the Commis- 
sioner. The law, in its terms, provides that I shall accept or reject the 
samples so obtained, and I briefly do accept or reject them, stating that those 
accepted are pure, and that those rejected are not fit for sale at the Agency. 
On accepting the situation, (which I deemed at the outset a responsible one,) 
although I had some previous acquaintance with the subject, I found it 
necessary, to enable me to meet all the possible cases that might occur, to 



702 APPENDIX. 

study the subject more extensively, and I have studied in that direction, and 
have made almost daily observations in connection with the analysis of liquors. 
The samples brought from the Commissioner are subjected to analysis in my 
laboratory. The different spirits are classified, the wines also, and there is, 
at the same time that the chemical analysis is being performed, an examina- 
tion made into the quality of the liquor, the quality depending, not wholly 
upon the proportion of alcohol present, or in the case of wine, upon the 
aroma, so to speak, of the wine, but upon certain characteristics, which give 
value to the spirits, and which must be necessarily stated in considering the 
place of the particular spirit, in regard to price. In order to place this more 
distinctly before you, I will suppose a case of two years old brandy, which is a 
very common one. I will suppose it to be a sound, well-made brandy. If 
that brandy has been properly stored, as the manufacturer knows how to 
adapt the conditions to increasing its value, at the end of ten years it will be 
worth eight dollars per gallon, and during all this time, nothing has been 
added to it. We are obliged, therefore, to be prepared for cases of this kind, 
§o as not to place in the category of two dollar brandy, that brandy which is 
richly worth eight dollars. In making the price of a brandy, the manufacturer 
takes into view the operation which it undergoes through age, and a moderate 
temperature. The effort is to produce in the brandy a kind of ether, and the 
quantity of that ether present in the brandy, modifies its action upon the system, 
and in its appeals to the appetite makes up a large part of the value of the brandy, 
as will be seen in the prices of old as compared with new brandies of the same 
manufacturer. Another point which is taken into consideration, and which is 
especially important when a wine is considered in relation to its sanitary 
qualities, is whether the wine was or was not prepared from the juice of the 
grape, either wholly or in part. It must be apparent to every one of the 
Committee, that under the enormously increased consumption of wine, without 
any corresponding extension of the area of grape culture, a very large pro- 
portion of the whole wine sold is not produced from grape juice, and deem- 
ing, in its medical relations especially, that point of importance, I have 
carefully examined into the manufactory of wine in other countries, and have 
devised those checks and tests by which we are enabled to distinguish those 
wines which are made from the grape juice principally (which are now very 
few), and those which are made from a product of the potato. The domestic 
spirits which are also important from the amount of their consumption, are 
most carefully scrutinized in regard to their age and maturity, as compared 
with the more recent spirits, and especially the presence of certain poisonous 
compounds which belong to another class of bodies. I may say, as a general 
remark, that the utmost care is given to these examinations, and that early 
after the commencement of my duties I found it extremely difficult to get 
spirits of the high standard which I thought were required, and from time to 
time it has been difficult since. At the present moment I may say, that there 
is a very much larger proportion of impure spirits and unmatured liquors sold 
than at any former period within my knowledge. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) Do you often have occasion to reject spirits ? 

A. I do, though less often than earlier in my practice. 



APPENDIX. 703 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Can you take a lot of wine enforced slightly by 
brandy, of the same material as the wine, and tell whether or not it has been 
enforced ? 

A. Very easily. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Much has been said, first and last, upon the subject 
of the impurity of liquors. Would you like to add anything upon the subject ? 

A. lam constantly engaged in the analyzis of liquors that do not come 
from the sources of supply to the Agency, and I have, therefore, an opportu- 
nity of comparing the liquors that are being sold generally, with those which 
are sold at or purchased by the State Agency, and I can state, as the result of 
my observations, that the liquors generally sold are to a very large extent 
sophisticated. 

Q. By which, do you mean manufactured ? 

A. They are manufactured liquors, either changed from their natural 
condition, or sold in that condition, and sold after their value has been 
reduced. 

Q. Do you find that remark to apply to what are called low houses or dis- 
reputable dealers only, or does it also apply to what are called first-class 
houses ? 

A. I think that it applies generally. I ought, perhaps, to make this quali- 
fying distinction, that in cases where the liquors of retailers have been seized, 
there have been fewer cases where liquors of tolerable value have been found, 
than in cases where particular samples have been analyzed at the request of 
physicians, or in pursuance of some particular plan, in order to be more fully 
acquainted with what was for sale at other establishments. 

Q. The seized liquors are generally worse ? 

A. They are generally the worst, although in most cases there are one or 
two samples which would be considered as tolerable liquor ; in nearly every 
case, however, nearly every specimen would be rejected as impure, or as 
changed from the original standard. 

Q, And yet these are seized of parties who are -currently selling in the 
different grades of trade or society ? 

A. So I understand. 

Q. You would then deem the samples analyzed as very fair representatives 
of what is, upon the whole, proffered publicly to drink ? 

A. By retailers, I would. 

Q. Would you feel like making any statement, or giving any opinion, in 
regard to the influence of these liquors upon the human economy ? 

A. I know the influence of liquors upon the human economy. It has 
been a subject of study. 

Q. We shall be very glad to hear any statement that you may feel at 
liberty to make. 

A. I will briefly state here that the immature liquors, or the new liquors 
of the strictly spirituous kind, exert a poisonous influence ; and that apart 
from their alcoholic constituents, strictly. 

Q. New liquors exert a poisonous influence aside from their alcoholic 
influence ? 



704 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. The remark applies to immature wines, and to beverages, 
especially where they are compounded from immature liquors, which are 
generally chosen for that purpose. 

Q. Then speaking in general terms, supposing you were giving to a body 
of young men, counsel in regard to the use of beverages, even including wine, 
what should you feel called upon to say to them, in the way of counsel, as 
to the safety of their using such beverages ? 

A. I should state very directly to the young, and in the same words to the 
old, that the use of spirits, in the way of beverages, and in this climate, must 
lead to a diminishing of the vital sources, and doubtless to the shortening of 
life ; that there are cases, where a point is to be surmounted, or a difficulty 
to be overcome, when the use of spirits, in some form, may enable the system 
to pass that point or to overcome that difficulty, and lead as other medicines 
lead, to improved health. 

Q. But you would restrict such use strictly to what might be called exigen- 
cies in the condition of the system ? 

A. I would. 

Q. You used the expression, " must lead to the shortening of life ; " you 
did not use a stronger term than you intended ? 

A. No, sir; I believe that is the result of all the knowledge that we 
possess upon the subject. 

Q. You observed, perhaps, the testimony of a medical gentleman, upon a 
former occasion, before this Committee ? 

A. I heard the testimony of several medical gentlemen. 

Q. Were you present ? 

A. I was. 

Q. As our object is the truth, and not the criticism of those gentlemen, 
are there any further remarks, bearing upon any point of their testimony, 
that you feel it your duty to submit ? 

A. I do not think of any. I think that Professor Clarke gave you the 
physiology of the matter, most clearly and beautifully. 

Q. In your judgment, while their statements may have been fairly, cor- 
rectly and scientifically given, I ask you whether the freedom with which 
they spoke of the healthful, medicinal and alimentative qualities of intoxica- 
ting beverages, and the reticence of Jhat testimony in regard to the damaging 
influences of alcohol, were fitted to leave just that impression, which as a man 
of science, you would wish to have left upon the minds of hearers ? 

A. I can hardly judge of that. My impression, from hearing the testi- 
mony, was, that it applied to the medical use rather than to the general use 
of spirits, — to the use, rather than (if you will allow me the expression), to 
the abuse of spirits. 

Q. Would you feel like expressing an opinion, as a chemist, that the detec- 
tion of acetic acid in the breath, was a just chemical test of the problem, 
whether or not alcohol is transformed in the human system ? 

A. I fhink that if the vapor of acetic acid should be detected in the 
breath of a person taking alcohol, that a series of change would be indicated. 
Alcohol, we well know, under the condition of the breathing process, if 



APPENDIX. 705 

changed. It rims through two or three modifications, the final result of which 
is acetic acid. 

I think that there was one gentleman who testified in regard to the fat-pro- 
ducing value of alcohol, and I thought at the moment, without sufficient reflec- 
tion, that chemists knew no way in which alcohol, pure alcohol, I will say, 
divested of its oils, can be converted into fat in the system, nor is there any 
information, so far as I know, tending to establish such a fact. It is, I think, 
a mere hypothesis, without a chemical basis. • 

Q. Do you now speak of the allegation that alcohol produces fat ? 

A. That it produces fat or is a substitute for it. 

Q. Do you mean to say that alcohol never becomes fat, or is substituted 
for it, or do you mean to say that the influence of alcohol upon the human 
economy, is not to accumulate fat through its agency, though it is not a pro- 
duct of it ? 

A. I do not think that we know its agency in regard to fat-forming or non- 
fat-forming tissues, but the remark , as I understand it, was that it took the 
place of fat in the system. 

Q. The remark was several times made, that alcoholic influences take the 
place of food, by arresting the disintegration of tissue, in view of its being 
transformed into tissue ; does your observations affirm the proposition, and if 
so, do you regard it as a circumstance favorable to health, or the reverse ? 

A. I believe that it is allowed by all who have made any investigations 
upon the subject, that alcohol, like a variety of bodies, does arrest the disinte- 
gration of the tissues for the moment, but that is an unnatural, and not a 
healthy condition. There are a large number of bodies of the same class as 
alcohol which produces this effect. 

Q. Is the disintegration of tissue as essential to health, and one of the essen- 
tial conditions of continual health, as the formation of tissue ? 

A . Hardly ; we have no life without death. 

Q. What, in your opinion, would be the results upon the public good, if all 
alcoholic preparations could be annihilated ? 

A. I have never formed any opinion upon that subject. I do not know, 
and am ready to confess my ignorance. 

Q. What would be your conviction as to the influence upon the public 
good, if all alcoholic beverages, in any other than the medicinal sense of their 
use, should be, in the main, abolished ? 

A. I think that in this climate we could well do without them. I think 
there would be a decrease of crime, and a large decrease of misery and idle- 
ness, and of all the ills which result from the abuse of spirits as seen at 
present. 

Q. In relation to the test of acetic acid in the breath, you stated the con- 
dition upon which you would regard its detection as an indication of the 
presence of alcohol. Suppose you know nothing definitely, beyond the fact 
that you find indications of alcohol in the breath, and indications of acetic 
acid in the breath, — would you necessarily conclude that the acetic acid was 
produced by the transformations of alcohol ? 

A. Not unless the previous circumstances had been observed so well that 
we could positively state that no acetic acid had been exhibited. 
89 



706 APPENDIX. 

Q. Then, as a fact of any value, chemically speaking, it would be needful 
to observe, with the greatest care, what had been taken into the stomach ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. So that, resting upon the simple fact that acetic acid was detected in 
the breath, it could not be considered as proved that alcohol had been trans- 
formed ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you fallen in with a pamphlet published in London in 1866 by 
Dr. Lees ? 

A. I have only seen a short review of it. 

Q. You have no opinion upon the general conclusions therein main- 
tained ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Your opinion is, that the removal of alcoholic beverages of all kinds, 
would be a great gain. Do you except from that statement wine ? 

A. No, sir, I would not except wine in this climate. I would make the 
reply, allowing that amount to be accessible which the physician would feel 
called upon to employ for medical purposes, restricting the consumption to 
that limit. I think there would be an increase of health, and an escape from 
the evils which now threaten us. 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 707 



TWENTIETH DAY 



Tuesday, March 26, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony on 
behalf of the Remonstrants was continued. 

Testimony of Prof. William S. Tyler. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Will you state the position which you occupy ? 

A. Professor of Greek in Amherst College. 

Q. With the chief questions before the Committee, I take it you are by 
this time conversant. Will you state, as briefly as you may be able, your 
views in regard to the expediency of suspending our prohibitory law, and 
whatever facts you have, or observations you may have made, bearing upon 
that subject ? 

A. I suppose the question concerns the comparative merits of a license law 
and a prohibitory law. During more than thirty years' residence in Amherst, 
and observation of the effects of both laws, I must say, that my associations 
with the license law are not very agreeable or very pleasant. According to 
my observation and my best recollection, the license law had to be changed 
every few years, and worked about as badly as anything could. Certainly 
quite as badly as the prohibitory law now does, and without the possibility of 
any of the good results that might flow from a prohibitory law. I recollect 
very well that it had to be amended or made over every two or three years. 
It would look pretty well for a little while. They would make a new law, or 
amend the old one ; and for a time, perhaps, it would be a check upon the 
sale of unlicensed liquor. The liquor-sellers were shy of it, and were afraid 
to sell for a little while. But very soon, some of the small fish would slip 
through the net, and soon after, some great ones would break though ; and 
very soon, it let every one through, and the net had to be hauled up and 
mended. Then the same experiment was tried over again, with precisely the 
same result. There were constant efforts to make the law so stringent that 
it would prevent the sale, and so that it would execute itself; but it never 
would execute itself, and never would prevent the sale. While the broom 
was new, it swept tolerably clean for a very little while, but as it grew older, 
it left things more and more dirty, until at length they became very dirty, 
and became a stench in the nostrils of the community, and everybody was 
glad to get rid of it ; the friends of temperance were as glad to get rid of it 
as the rumsellers were. That is my recollection of the license law. No law 
will execute itself, I take it. Certainly, the old license law did not execute 
itself, and no license law will execute itself, in my judgment ; and I predict, 
that if a license law should be passed by this Legislature, it would not be 
three years before there would be just as much unlicensed sale of intoxicating 



708 APPENDIX. 

drinks as there is now, and the licensed sale would be just about a clear 
addition to the amount of sales that are now made. Moreover, the sale under 
license, would render it respectable, and would introduce it into a higher 
and more respectable class of society. It would be a temptation for the 
children and youth of higher and better families than are now tempted to 
drunkenness. And, moreover, it would extend the sanction of the law over 
it, and thus justify it in the eyes of law-abiding men. In my opinion, a 
prohibitory law can be enforced just as well as a license law. If it were 
enforced, it would be a great deal better ; and my impression is, that the 
reason why the liquor-sellers are so thoroughly excited upon the subject of 
the prohibitory law just now is, that they find they have reached the end of 
their rope. The rope just begins to draw ; and, as we well know, — 

" None ere felt the halter draw 
With good opinion of the law." 

Q. To what extent do you judge you express the opinion of your board 
of instruction and the government of your college ? 

A. The unanimous opinion of the officers of the immediate government 
and instruction — that is, the Faculty. They have expressed their opinion in 
writing, by sending a remonstrance against a license law to the Legislature, 
quite recently. It was signed by every member of the Faculty, except Pro- 
fessor Clark, who is here and can speak for himself, and will speak for himself 
when he is called upon. 

Q. There is nothing in the state of the case in the town of Amherst that 
shakes your confidence in the practicability of prohibiting the traffic in liquors 
as a beverage ? 

A. Nothing at all. As regards the sentiment of the college students, four- 
fifths of them have likewise signed a remonstrance, which has, I believe, been 
presented to the Legislature. I would not be absolutely certain as to the 
exact numerical proportion, but I think it is four-fifths. The petition for a 
license law on the part of our officials was followed by a remonstrance, which 
was signed by certainly two or three times as many names as were signed to 
the petition for a license ; and having canvassed one district myself, I have 
had a good opportunity to find out what the public sentiment is in relation to 
this matter, and I find that, with unexpected and gratifying unanimity, the 
friends of temperance are still the friends of the prohibitory law, and opposed 
to a license law. Some of them, perhaps, may have had some hesitation in 
relation to the execution of the law, in consequence of the existing state of 
things in the Commonwealth, as a whole ; but as it regards the judgment and 
conscience and common sense of the old friends of temperance, they were 
unanimous in giving the prohibitory law their approval, so far as I canvassed 
the town. I was not prepared to find so great unanimity on that subject as I 
did. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You spoke of the very frequent changes of the old 
law prior to the passage of the prohibitory law. Do you know how many 
changes were made ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. 

Q. Do you know what the nature of those changes was ? 



APPENDIX. 709 

A. My impression is, for the purpose of making the law more stringent as 
a general thing. 

Q. Have you any knowledge as to the precise provisions ? 

A. I have not looked up the thing in detail. I am obliged to say to the 
Committee, I have only my general recollection on the subject. 

Q. There were two modifications of the law — one the Act restricting the 
sale of intoxicating liquor, and the other the Sunday law. Do you know of 
any other ? 

A. I have no other in mind now. 

Q. Have you anything in your mind now as to the character of that 
legislation ? 

A. Nothing accurate or definite. 

Q. Have you anything in general as to the character of that legislation ? 

A. I think I have a very intelligent opinion as to the general character 
of it. 

Q. How accurate is your knowledge of the facts upon which you base that 
opinion ? 

A. I cannot state what the statutes were, I am free to say. 

Q. Have you any facts now in your mind with sufficient clearness to enable 
you to-day to base an opinion upon those facts ? 

A. I think I have, to base an opinion upon. I think I have the opinion 
that it made us a great deal of trouble, and finally became offensive to the 
community, who were all glad to get rid of it. 

Q. What was the nature of the trouble from 1842 to 1852 ? 

A. The difficulty of executing the law, and the fact that, after a very 
short time, it became a dead letter. That is my impression of it, and I am 
very sure it was so in Amherst. 

Q. In Hampshire County, for a great many years before the prohibitory 
law was passed, there were no licenses, were there ? 

A. I cannot remember how long. I have no distinct recollection on that 
point. 

Q. Where there were no licenses, was there not a prohibitory law practi- 
cally in force ? 

A. I do not remember how long the prohibitory law has been in existence. 

Q. Whenever they ceased to grant licenses in the county of Hampshire, 
could any liquor be legally sold there ? 

A. I have not looked over the subject with sufficient care to answer the 
question. 

Q. You do not know the fact ? 

A. I do not know the exact fact. My impressions are of a general nature. 

Q. You say this license law operated during that period very badly. Now, 
if it turns out that during the ten years to which I have alluded, there were 
no licenses, and a prohibitory law was practically in force, what is the value 
of your opinion as to the operation of that license law ? 

A. I think it is an opinion entitled to weight with all who know me, as 
based on general grounds. 



710 APPENDIX. 

Q. Everybody knows you honorably, sir ; but you say you have your 
opinion upon the ground that the license law then in force operated so badly 
that it became a stench in the nostrils of the community. 

A. I cannot be mistaken in my opinion in regard to that matter. I know 
there was a license law at the time to which my impressions have reference. 

Q. What time was that ? 

A. I cannot tell the year. My memory is not accurate as to dates, I am 
obliged to say ; but I am very sure of my own impression as to the state of 
things under a license law and a prohibitory law. 

Q. Can you give your impression in regard to any time within the ten 
years prior to 1852 ? 

A. My memory for dates is very bad. 

Q. Have you any knowledge as to the operation of the license law, or 
any other law, during the ten years from 1842 to 1852 ? 

A. I cannot say I have any distinct recollection as to dates about it. 

Q. Have you any impression as to the operation of the law one way or 
the other in those ten years ? 

A. I cannot say I have, in regard to those ten years. 

Q. What sort of a license law was it, about which your opinion of its 
unfavorable operation is so strong ? 

A. A law licensing certain persons to sell, and prohibiting others from 
selling. 

Q. How sell? 

A. Sell for use as a beverage, as I understand it. 

Q. Open bars ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Does your impression of the ill effects of this law relate particularly 
to the saloon and open bar traffic, where young men go and sit and drink ? 

A. My impression of the state of things under the license law is associated 
with bar-rooms particularly. 

Q. You are not aware that in your part of the country there have been 
no bar-rooms legally open from 1841 or '42 up to this time ? 

A. I have no recollection in regard to dates, sir. 

Q. Do you not know that, for more than twenty-five years, there has not 
been, in all Western Massachusetts, a bar-room or tippling-shop legally 
opened ? 

A. I do not remember the length of time, sir. 

Q. Then, if you speak of the state of temperance anywhere during the 
last twenty-five years, when there was no license law, and no tippling-shops 
legally open, how do you attribute these evils to the effect of a license law. 

A. I have a distinct recollection in reference to those laws when they were 
in operation. It is a general recollection, I must say. 

Q. You mean, you have a distinct recollection of the period when the 
effect of the tippling-shops and open bars was so injurious ? Is that the 
period of time to which you allude, without fixing the date ? 

A. Yes. I have a recollection, likewise, in reference to those laws them- 
selves at the time they were in operation. 



APPENDIX. 711 

Q. That is, at the time tippling-shops and open bars were permitted by law ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. And your opinion is in regard to that time ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. "What else was there that fell within your observation, aside from these 
tippling-shops and open bars, that was objectionable and injurious ? 

A. I think our young men obtained intoxicating drinks and were intoxi- 
cated in college, at those times, more than they are now. 

Q. I speak of those places where they got liquor, aside from the bars 
and tippling-shops ? 

A. I don't know where they got it. 

Q. Have you any distinct recollection as to the evils about which you 
testify within twenty-five years, or does your recollection relate to periods 
prior to that ? 

A. I have a general recollection, extending over the whole thirty years I 
have been connected with the college. 

Q. You have spoken of the peculiar evils you have observed. Were those 
evils observed by you within the last twenty-five years, or were they prior to 
that? 

A. My recollection is quite as distinct of a period prior to that. I was a 
student in Amherst, and then a tutor for two years, and my professorship 
commenced in 1825. My recollection is more lively and distinct of those 
earlier days than of more recent times. 

Q. Have you any facts observed by you within the last twenty-five years 
on which you can base an opinion ? 

A. Yes, I have a general recollection, a recollection of comparative effects 
that I can rely upon. 

Q. Well, for these last twenty-five years, what has been the state of tem- 
perance ? Has it been better or worse than it was prior ? 

A. It has been some of the time better and some of the time worse. 
There have been great changes, I should think. That is my recollection. 

Q. At what period of these last twenty-five years was it worse ? 

A . I cannot give you the dates. 

Q. As a whole, has it improved during the last twenty-five years ? 

A. I think it has improved, as a whole, in the college and in the commun- 
ity. I should think, decidedly, that very great improvement had been made 
over thirty or thirty-five years ago. Taking the whole period of my connec- 
tion with Amherst, I think there has been great improvement in temperance. 

Q. Has there been any improvement the last fifteen years over the ten 
years prior ? 

A. 1 should judge that during the larger part of the last fifteen years 
there had been. That is my impression. 

Q. A prohibitory law being in force over the whole twenty-five years in 
your part of the Commonwealth, to what do you attribute the improvement 
in the last fifteen years over the prior ten ? 

A. I have the impression that the prohibitory law was better enforced 
some ten or fifteen years ago. It is a general impression, I must confess, in 
regard to dates. 



712 APPENDIX. 

Q. For the last eight or ten years has it been particularly well enforced ? 

A. I think it was pretty well enforced, eight or ten years ago, in Amherst. 
I am sorry my recollection as to dates is not better. 

Q. Liquor is sold in Amherst ? 

A. Yes, sir, I think it is. 

Q. There is intemperance in Amherst now ? 

A. There is intemperance in a low stratum of society; very little above 
that stratum. It is a very low stratum, and furnishes very little temptation to 
respectable young men. 

Q. Have you any other opinion on the subject than that such legislation 
should take place as would most effectually check the evil ? 

A. I desire very much that the Commonwealth should stand upon righteous 
rather than unrighteous legislation, and should base her legislation upon the 
right principle rather than the wrong one. I think the principle of the pro- 
hibitory law is right, and the principle of the license law wrong. A license 
law practically says that by paying a sufficient sum of money, you have the 
right to make drunkards, and destroy the lives of men by selling intoxicating 
drinks. The Commonwealth thus becomes particeps criminis, and responsible 
for it. Whereas a prohibitory law rests upon the same just basis, in my judg- 
ment, as the right of the community to protect itself against the cholera or 
plague, or any form of wholesale evil, vice or crime. 

Q. If legislators, looking over the subject, come to the conclusion that they 
cannot entirely prevent it, and undertake to pass laws to restrain it, do they 
thereby saction that which they permit ? 

A. They sanction that which they license, it seems to me. 

Q. Is that exactly so ? Do they sanction that which they license ? 

A. It seems so to me. 

Q. Well, I put this case : Here is an article of commerce which is used 
in the community. The Legislature, looking over the ground, think it ought 
to be checked — would be glad to restrain it ; and believing that an attempt to 
entirely prohibit it would fail of any effect in the long run, they conclude to 
check this evil by some law or other as far as they can, and pass such a law. 
In that case, should you say the Legislature sanctioned the sale that is made 
under the law ? 

A. They should certainly settle with absolute certainty the question 
whether a prohibitory law can be executed, in the first place. 

Q. Exactly ; that is the first question ; but I am on the principle. Do 
you think that in the case supposed, they sanction the sale ? 

A. I cannot suppose a case in which it would be right for the Legislature 
to authorize the sale of arsenic as an article of food, or the sale of opium as an 
article for common use. 

Q. In legal contemplation, all these things are of lawful sale, unless 
restrained. You don't apprehend that the licensing of a man gives the first 
right to sell liquor ? 

A. Nothing can give him the moral right; but it gives him the legal 
right. 

Q. Hadn't he the legal right before ? As long as it is property, a man has 
a right to sell it, under our system of government, and always had ; but if the 



APPENDIX. 713 

sale produces evil, then comes in the right to restrain. Now, in restraining, 
do you undertake to say, that the Legislature sanction it, and that the right 
to sell comes through the Legislature only ? 

A. I do not say it proceeds from them wholly ; but I say they thus extend 
their sanction over the traffic — over a thing which is wrong, and cannot be 
made right by their sanction. To authorize the sale of opium or the sale of 
arsenic, as a common article of diet, or of any poison as a beverage, would be 
so far forth extending the sanction of the government over the sale cf it for 
that purpose. 

Q. If I get your idea correctly, you are not particularly wedded to any 
precise form of law, but whatever law would best effect the object of prevent- 
ing drunkenness and checking intemperance would be properly commended 
to any Legislature, would it not ? 

A. I should commend most heartily a decided effort to execute the law; 
and I would not give it up until at least we had tried it more faithfully than 
wc have. 

Q. You have made a comparison of the prohibitory law with a license law. 
Do you understand the law that is proposed here and against which you were 
called to testify ? 

A. I believe I understand essentially what it is. 

Q. It is to leave it entirely to the towns to say whether the prohibitory 
law shall be enforced or not. If they vote not to license, then the prohibitory 
law is in full force. Do you understand that feature of it ? 

A. If you ask my judgment, my judgment is, that it is desirable to keep 
the prohibitory law on the statutes until we have made a far more thorough 
effort than we have yet made for its execution ; and my belief is, that it can 
be executed just as well as a license law. It will not execute itself, any more 
than a license law, but it can be executed just as well as a license law. A 
license law becomes inefficient after a few years, and it is just so with a pro- 
hibitory law. It is necessary to screw up the machine occasionally. 

Q. Do you understand that it is proposed to repeal the prohibitory law ? 

A. I do not know very definitely what gentlemen propose. 

Q. Your opinion is formed from the license law as it existed thirty years 
ago, and the present prohibitory law ? 

A . In great measure, that is it. 

Q. And therefore, when you speak of the fruits, in your region, of a pro- 
hibitory law as compared with a license law, it is a comparison of the present 
prohibitory law with the license law of thirty years ago ? 

A. It is more definitely that than anything else. 

Testimony of Dr. Augustus A. Hayes, (continued.) 
Q. (By Mr. Miner.) If I recollect right, you had proceeded so far in 
in your testimony as to give a very decided judgment against the use of alco- 
holic beverages, either by young or old, testifying that, in your judgment, it 
would necessarily lessen the vital forces and shorten human life. I would like 
to have you state, if you feel free to do so, the result of your scientific obser- 
vations and experiments upon certain elementary questions involved in that 
general proposition. 

90 



714 APPENDIX. 

A. My reply to your question referred to the action of spirits upo. 
sons in health. I make the exception of all those cases where the physicu 
ordered the use of spirits. 

Q. In respect to the effects of alcoholic beverages, as the external exhibi- 
tion varies at different stages of their influence, is their influence, from the 
beginning on to inebriety, homogeneous ? That is, is it a tending in the same 
direction continually ? 

A . I think, if the amount be kept in view, that the movement is contin- 
uously and homogeneously towards intoxication. Small quantities of spirit- 
uous liquors taken into the stomach may not, of course, advance so far as to 
produce any exhibition of intoxication ; and there is some modification pro- 
duced by the condition of the stomach, — whether it be full or empty. 

Q. Suppose that the stomach be empty, or nearly so, so that the alcoholic 
influence may be directly upon the gastric juice, what result ensues ? 

A. There is derangement, sir, where the stomach is empty, and the spirit- 
uous liquor is of considerable strength, such as ordinary spirit — rum and whis- 
key. Then there is a direct action upon the lining of the stomach, which is 
not resisted by what is termed the mucous membrane ; but if the spirit be 
much diluted, then that direct action is very much modified in amount, and 
the usual rapid absorption of the spirit takes place. 

Q. Subsequently to which the secretion of the gastric juice and its offices 
go on, in general, as before ? 

A. Not until the spirit has passed from the stomach proper, which it does 
very rapidly indeed. 

Q. Is there any chemical change produced in the gastric juice by alcoholic 
influence ? 

A. We have no positive knowledge upon the subject. It is only by infer- 
ence that we speak of that. 

Q. What is the influence of alcohol, taken even with the food, upon 
digestion ? 

A. I .happen to have made some observations upon the action of wine, 
and can speak more directly upon that point than upon the influence of spir- 
itd. In the wine districts of France, especially, — and I think the remark may 
extend to the wine districts of Germany, — the peasantry make use of a very 
coarse kind of bread ; bread which I should think the human stomach would 
hardly digest without that addition of the ration of sour wine which is con- 
stantly made in those countries. It appeared to me, from the observations 
which I made, that the small bottle of wine, the very sour and very slightly 
alcoholic wine, which was drank, by the peasantry, enabled the stomach to 
pass over the difficulty which it would encounter in digesting the food. The 
bread was made partly of rye and partly of beans, with a great deal of husk 
in it ; and the nutriment was obtained from it, I think, through the influence 
of the spirit which formed a part of the ration. 

My inquiries extended a little further, to the subsistence of the same class 
of persons on other food. The opinion I have in regard to that comes second- 
hand, for a friend made the observations, not myself. The ration of the 
French soldier is well known, and its influence upon the system has been 
most carefully studied. Now, in the Crimean war, these soldiers came under 



APPENDIX. 715 

the ration of the British soldier. The bowl of coffee was substituted in the 
morning for the wine, and no wine or spirit was used, and the men became 
much more efficient under that ration, than under that to which they had 
been accustomed as soldiers, taking a bottle of wine either once or twice 
per day. 

I think there are other cases where a weak spirit, in the form of wine, 
which is a very compound fluid, taken into the stomach, enables it to pass 
over the difficulty which it may meet with in digesting some kinds of food. 

Q. Taking our own country, and our general habits of diet here, and 
considering the fact that it is not the light wines of foreign countries that are 
used, but the stronger drinks prevailing here, what should you say, in general, 
was their effect upon digestion ? 

A. I am not led to the conclusion, that the same effects would be observed 
in our climate. Our climate is exceptional ; the exposures are exceptional ; 
and the observations which I made were made in wine countries, where, if 
possible, wine becomes a natural beverage. 

Q. So that you would not anticipate the same beneficial influences in our 
climate ? 

A. I should not, from anything I know on the subject at present. 

Q. In general, would your opinion be adverse to th£ proposition, that 
digestion is aided, ordinarily, by the beverages that prevail in this country. 

A. It would, in this climate. In a healthy system, I think derangement 
would follow in every case where a ration was formed in part of spirit. 

Q. Your testimony, then, is that you think the use of liquors here would 
not be beneficial to digestion, but would lead to derangement, in healthy 
persons ? 

A. Yes, sir, that is what I intended to express. 

Q. Will you state your opinion in reference to the deleterious influence 
of alcohol on the human system ; that is, whether it affects more particularly 
one part than another. 

A. Alcohol as alcohol, or as diluted alcohol, is rapidly absorbed, and does 
enter the brain in the absorption. The effects are transient. Experiments 
have been made which prove that fact — that it enters the brain, and that it 
deranges the circulation of the blood. So far, we know ; but the ultimate 
action of alcohol is unknown to us. It is a body which very strongly attracts 
oxygen; so strongly, that it burns under one form of combustion at the 
natural temperature. At the temperature of the body, it attracts oxygen 
rapidly, and the effect of spirituous liquors is seen almost immediately upon 
the arterial blood, from which the oxygen is withdrawn, the arterial blood 
being converted into venous blood, and of course the nourishment of the 
system is prevented for the time. 

Q. Then instead of promoting nutrition (speaking of its influence on 
people in health), it prevents nutrition temporarily ? 

A. It prevents nutrition. It acts, as I said the other day, and, as I 
believe, you have other testimony, to prevent the breaking down of the tissues, 
and in so doing, it acts simply as a foreign body. There are a number of 
bodies that act in the same way. 



716 APPENDIX. 

Q. And, in the breaking down of tissue, it prevents the healthy restoration, 
or building up ? 

A. The healthy life action. I cannot reply directly to the question on 
which part it acts. It acts so instantaneously that it includes many parts in its 
course. The first action is on the stomach. 

Q. My question really aimed at this point : whether there was any special 
affinity between alcohol and any parts of the physical system ? 

A. I do not think the word " affinity " can be used there. I do not know 
that it acts specially upon any particular part. It deranges in its course of 
absorption both secretions and vessels. 

Q. What diseases would you expect from the continuous action of alcoholic 
beverages ? 

A. I can hardly give you the results, from any observation that I have 
made. They are open almost to common observation. The general break- 
down of the system is well understood, and the changes produced in the 
kidneys and the liver both. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You are not a practising physician ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Are you a Doctor of Medicine ? 

A. I am a Doctor of Medicine. 

Q. Have you ever practised ? 

A. I have never practised. I have never prepared myself for practise. 
My department has been that of Medical Chemistry. 

Q. You do not know, then, what classes of disease to expect from the over- 
use of alcoholic drinks ? 

A. No, sir, I cannot say positively. I do not know in any general sense. 

Q. Do you know as a matter of general scientific knowledge ? 

A. As a matter of scientific knowledge, I know that the system is exten- 
sively deranged ; no further. Not that any particular disease can be traced 
to the use of spirituous liquors. 

Q. And you do not know whether it is the lungs, the brain, the kidneys, or 
the stomach which is most likely to be injuriously affected. ? 

A. I do not, of my own knowledge, know those facts. 

Q. When you spoke, doctor, of the effect produced upon people in disease, 
as compared with the effect produced upon people in health, where is your 
line of discrimination between sick people and healthy people ? 

A. The ordinary line, where the system becomes deranged to such an 
extent that the patient is aware of it. There are cases — very few indeed — 
where the patient is not perhaps so well aware as the physician is of the 
derangement ; but I refer to all cases where there is no considerable depar- 
ture from the normal condition of health. 

Q. Are you not aware that an entirely different theory prevails throughout 
the whole medical world concerning disease, from that which used to 
obtain ? Is it not true that disease used to be regarded among men of 
large scientific pretentions, as some positive enemy introduced into the system, 
whereas they have learned to know that it is only a modification of health, — 
something less than health, — and that the line between health and disease is 



APPENDIX. 717 

so delicate that only the most careful clinical observation can sometimes 
detect it ? 

A. I know, sir, that these theories prevail; and medical theories are not 
only very numerous, but extend over a very large surface ; yet, I think, when 
you come to any practical view of the subject, it is easy to determine whether 
the patient is in health or in disease. 

Q. That is, a skilful physician can determine by clinical observation ? 
Is that what you mean ? 

A. I think the physician can discover it ; and, more often, the patient 
himself. 

Q. Now, do you think the Legislature can discover in advance at all ? 
A. I hardly know how far the Legislature can go. I have a very high 
respect for that body, but I do not know how far they can go. 

Q. Have you ever read Dr. James Jackson's "Letters to a Young Physi- 
cian," published several years ago ? 
A. I have, sir, and possess the work. 

Q. Do you agree with Dr. Jackson's observations upon the subject of the 
use of these beverages ? 

A. I do not now remember exactly — many years have passed — what his 
conclusions are. But Dr. James Jackson must be accounted as one of the 
highest authorities who has ever written upon the subject, — if he ever has so 
written. 

Q. You would regard him as safe and wise an authority as there has ever 
been in Massachusetts ? 

A. Certainly, sir ; at his time of writing. 
Q. Have you ever read Dr. Carpenter's book on Alcohol ? 
A. I have read his essays as they have been published ; I think never his 
collected works, other than as a mere matter of reference. 

Q. I mean his book on the " Physiology of Temperance and Total- Absti- 
nance ? " 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are aware that Dr. Wni. B. Carpenter is considered the physio- 
logical leader of what may be called the total-abstinence party ? 

A. I do not know that. I knew Dr. Carpenter in his connection with the 
higher departments of science. 

Q. Are you aware that his authority is almost universally appealed to by 
the total-abstinence party ? 

A, No, sir. I have never mixed in any discussions on the point myself; 
and called before the Committee, and very desirous of giving them any infor- 
mation I possess on the subject, I cannot be supposed to appear here as taking 
one side or the other. 

Q. Then you have not even examined the subject enough to know what 
the opinions of Dr. Carpenter are ? 

A. Oh, yes, sir ; I have examined his opinions, but not with reference to 
any partisan position that he holds. 

Q. Do you not know as a fact, what his position is ? 

A. I do, sir. I can give you, perhaps, in a very few words, the grounds 
for some opinions. Dr. Carpenter has been considered as taking one and 



718 APPENDIX. 

rather an ultra view of the subject, and others have opposed that view. The 
arguments of both are open to us, and it is on the arguments that we form our 
opinions, not on the statements of individuals of their opinions. Now, it has 
happened to me, very fortunately, the late Dr. Muzzey being an instructor of 
mine, to have access to a great deal which he had compiled on this subject. I 
suppose he is known to most of the gentlemen here as one of the most thor- 
oughly studious medical men of New England, with a large practice, an 
extended field for observation, and an entire and thoroughly honest convic- 
tion on his part in regard to the use of spirituous liquors ; and therefore many 
points which would - otherwise have passed by without being observed, have 
been brought to my knowledge from my close intimacy with him during the 
last years of his life. 

Q. Dr. Muzzey took the most extreme views in reference to the disease of 
alcohol and alcoholic drinks ? 

A. I think he honestly did, sir. 

Q. Do you agree with him in those views or not ? 

A. I cannot say that I agree with all the views that Dr. Muzzey has 
expressed. 

Q. Wherein do you differ from Dr. Muzzey ? 

A. That it would be very difficult for me to say. 

Q. Do you or do you not differ from Dr. Muzzey, and if you do, to what 
extent do you differ from him ? 

A . I really should find it impossible to say now how much, without recur- 
ring, more than I have time to do, to what he has expressed. 

Q. Which should you prefer to put forward, among the great writers, as 
the representative man of physiological science, in their department, Dr. 
Carpenter or Dr. Muzzey ? 

A. I think, sir, it is very difficult to put any man forward as a representa- 
tive man. There has been a vast deal written on the subject which is before 
the Committee, and I do not know who would stand first or second in the case. 
I should be unwilling to express an opinion in regard to the standing of either 
of those gentlemen. 

Q. Should you be willing to have the Committee led by the opinions of 
either of them ? 

A. I should hope the Committee would not be led by the opinions of any 
man or any set of men. 

Q. On a question of science, in which the members of the Legislature are 
not experts, how do you expect them to arrive at true results unless they can 
trust, to some extent, somebody ? 

A. They can easily arrive at the facts on which opinions are based, by 
inquiring of physicians, at present standing at the head of the profession, 
which they have an opportunity to do, and from those facts draw their own 
conclusions. I do not think it would be safe for the Committee to take the 
opinions of Dr. Muzzey or the opinions of Dr. Carpenter, or the opinions of 
any other man. And if they wish to go into the literature of the subject, 
they will find many works devoted to the subject, and facts stated, and from 
these their conclusions can be drawn, if that can be done within the time they 
ean give to the subject. 



APPENDIX. 719 

Q. Do not both these gentlemen assume that they reach the conclusions 
they found after having considered, observed and weighed a very large 
number of facts, and made as broad a basis for theorizing as they had it in 
their power to do ? 

A. Assuredly they do. 

Q. Did not Dr. Muzzey come to the conclusion, not only that the sale of 
intoxicating drinks should be entirely surrendered, but that the use of all 
animal food should, in like manner, be given up ? 

A . I do not know that he ever stated his opinion in that form. 

Q. Did you ever read his last book on Health ? 

A. Certainly. Yes, sir. 

Q. Does he not advocate in that book what is commonly called " Gra- 
.hamism" ? 

A. Yes, sir; he adopted it himself, and prolonged his life through it, and 
spoke from those convictions. 

Q. Do you not remember that when, thirty years ago, Dr. Graham lectured 
all over New England, particularly in the colleges, it was under the special 
auspices of Dr. Muzzey, who introduced him to the colleges ? 

A . No, sir. I know he was introduced by respectable gentlemen ; and 
there can be no question whatever that very great benefit was derived from 
the change in diet induced through his lectures. But it is very wrong to draw 
any conclusions from a particular case. I have no doubt that alcoholic drink of 
any kind affected Dr. Muzzey injuriously. Late in life, just at that time when 
every man wishes to prolong his days, the attempt was made to use it in his 
case, under medical advice, and it failed utterly. But I think individual 
cases are not to be considered. 

Q. Do you mean to be understood now as advocating both the disuse of 
alcohol and of animal food ? 

A. By no means. No question has been asked me in regard to the entire 
disuse of alcohol. 

Q. Do you not know that Dr. Carpenter himself, in his seventh proposition, 
after having rung the changes on the objections to the use of alcohol in all 
cases but that of disease, at last admits that mild alcoholic drinks are useful 
for a large class of persons who are not yet in a state of disease ? 

A. I think that there is some statement of that kind, but that cannot 
influence an opinion. 

Q. It would not influence your opinion ? 

A. Not the simple statement of that fact. He states it simply as his 
opinion, — if he states it so broadly as that, — I think not. 

Q. [Reading.] " The same question has to be put with reference to a 
class of individuals who can scarcely be regarded as subjects of disease, but 
in whom the conditions are essentially different from those of health. These 
are such as, from constitutional debility, or early habits, or some other cause 
that does not admit of rectification, labor under an habitual deficiency of 
appetite and digestive power, even when they are living under circumstances 
generally most favorable to vigor, and when there is no indication of disor- 
dered action in any organ, — all that is needed being a slight increase in the 
capacity for preparing the aliment which the body really needs. Experi- 



720 APPENDIX. 

ence affords ample evidence that there are such cases, especially among those 
engaged in avocations which involve a good deal of mental activity ; and that, 
with the assistance of a small but habitual allowance of alcoholic stimulants, a 
long life of active exertion may be sustained ; whilst the vital powers would 
speedily fail without their aid, not for the want of direct support from them, 
but for the want of the measure of food which the system really needs, and 
which no other means seems so effectual in enabling it to appropriate." Do 
you agree or disagree with this conclusion of Dr. Carpenter ? 

A. I expressed the opinion in the direct examination in regard to that 
very feature, that the use of spirits, especially diluted spirits, does enable the 
system to overcome a mere obstacle of that kind ; but it is always in cases 
where there is a derangement, of course. 

Q. You spoke, Dr. Hayes, of the necessity of being governed by facts, 
rather than by the opinions of certain gentlemen. Now, let me ask you if 
you do not think it important, when undertaking to decide a question of this 
sort, upon a supposed basis of facts, that you should accumulate as large a 
number of facts, and make your area as broad as possible, and not undertake 
to generalize from a few facts simply, like the observations of one man ? 

A. I do. I think it is an error in examinations of this kind, that the 
deductions are from too small a basis of facts ; and I might remark further, 
that the deductions of the English physicians are generally drawn almost 
entirely from English literature. If they went into Germany they would find 
a much larger number of facts reported by very careful and accurate 
observers. 

Q. Have you ever examined the annual reports of the Registrar- General 
of Scotland upon the subject of health and disease in Scotland ? 

A. I have not, sir, specially. 

Q. Then you are not aware, that within the last three years the Registrar- 
General of Scotland has reported to the British Government that, in his 
opinion, the evidence proves that the moderate use of alcoholic liquors 
(including whiskey, which is largely consumed in Scotland) by the people 
so improves their health as to act as a counterpoise to the undoubtedly inju- 
rious effects produced by the extensive use of a few ? Are you aware that 
that opinion has been expressed ? 

A. No, sir. It would be an opinion founded upon a very limited number 
of observations, under certain conditions, in Scotland, taking into view the 
food and climate both. 

Q. Are you aware whether anybody, during all these many years of con- 
troversy in this country, has ever taken pains to accumulate the statistics and 
to draw a scientific deduction from them concerning the effect of the moderate 
and temperate use of these beverages ? 

A . I do not recollect any one who has embraced the subject so largely as 
you have suggested. Dr. Muzzey, as you well know, read in every direction, 
and two or three others in this country have been engaged on this subject ; 
but what progress they have made, or how far they have advanced, I cannot 
say. 

Q. They never gave us their statistics ? 



APPENDIX. 721 

A. Yes. A gentleman at the West, whose name I cannot recall, gave a 
very large number of facts, from his own observation, which were deemed 
very important at the time — some seven or eight years since. Whether he 
has pursued the subject or not, I do not know. 

Q. You do not possess them, do you ? 

A. I do not, sir. He is quoted by Dr. Muzzey in some of the doctor's 
writings, but I cannot now refer to it. 

Q. Do you know whether the statistics of mortality in this country, drawn 
from the census of the United States, show that diseases of that character 
usually ascribable to alcoholic causes, are greater or less in those States where 
prohibitory legislation prevails ? 

A. Oh, no, sir. I know nothing on that subject at all. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state, if that has not already been done, 
what is the exact result arrived at in the chemical analysis of brandy, for 
sxample ? 

A. The object arrived at in the analysis of brandy is, first, to determine 
the alcoholic strength of that brandy, the character of that alcohol, the pres- 
ence or absence of solid matter in the spirit, (the spirit always purporting to 
have been distilled, and therefore free from any solid matter,) and the solid 
matter found determined in its general composition, and its freedom from 
injurious or poisonous bodies or their presence. The quality of alcohol is 
determined by the presence in it of certain substances produced by the fer- 
mentation of wine and the nature of the more volatile parts of the liquor with 
reference to age or maturity. These are the points arrived at in the analysis, 
and in the careful analysis of a sample of brandy they are all reached. 

Q. In the analysis of brandy or other spirit, what is the standard of 
purity ? How is it determined ? 

A. In regard to brandy, the standard of purity is generally a sample of a 
known quality, and the departure from that, which of late years has become 
necessary, is also estimated in regard to this standard, or in regard to none. 

Q. What do you assume as the standard ? 

A. We assume as the best standard, that brandy which is manufactured in 
small quantities in France, in the district of Cognac, and called champagne 
brandy. It is the product of a distillation from the matured wine of that or 
the neighboring department. That is the highest standard of brandy. I may 
say that that standard is an exceptional one. I do not believe a sample of it 
has reached the country during the last ten years. Then we have other 
standards, also, such as Rochelle brandy. 

Q. Then you assume that you never find that kind of brandy in this 
country ? 

A. The whole of the finest quality is made up in the manufacture of cham- 
pagne, which, you know, is a factitious production, and the consumption in 
France rather exceeds the production there, and they are obliged to draw 
somewhat from Germany. That is a quality never met with here. Then 
there are gradations, and those, after practice, are easily understood. 

Q. You know how Cognac brandy itself is made, do you not ? 

A. I do, sir. 

Q. How is it ? 

91 



722 APPENDIX. 

A. The Cognac brandy is a distillation from mature wines of the depart- 
ment of Cognac. 

Q. Different kinds of wines ? 

A. Wines of that department. Like all other wines of this kind, the 
slightest departure from certain conditions involves the production of a differ- 
ent kind of product. That particular kind of brandy stands at the head, and 
is, of course, produced in limited quantity, as only a certain amount of the 
material to produce it can be found. 

Q. Assuming that you can never find at the State Agency any pure 
Cognac brandy, what do you look for ? 

A. My experience has not been confined to the State Agency, by any 
me ins. In the statement which I made, I gave you my observations abroad 
where that brandy is produced. In the market we meet with brandies of a 
high grade, and those, of course, are high-priced brandies. A certain price is 
fixed to a certain quality of brandy. Speaking of pure brandy, we speak of 
one that is perfectly pure, possessing the quality of the first-class quality of 
brandy to the same extent, and that extent regulated by price. In sjieaking 
of the quality used in connection with the observations which I have made, I 
might state that some years ago the price was fifteen dollars in France. Now 
an offer of fifty dollars might enable a person to obtain some of it. Now we 
find that brandy of half-price, would be very much more than half as to 
the quality ; and this is the way we determine the price by the standard. The 
standard is higher in proportion to the price than we should expect from the 
consideration of the price itself. 

Q. Does analysis enable you to tell these high grades of brandy at all ? 

A. It does, sir. 

Q. How does analysis enable you to discriminate — that is, so that it is not 
perfectly easy to imitate ? 

A. I should be obliged to repeat testimony that I have already given. 

Q. Can you determine by analysis and from present knowledge of brandy 
whether an agent might not be imposed upon both in the quality and value 
of French brandy, deteriorated by the admixture of various brandies in 
France, and by the introduction of American grape brandy ? 

A . We can so determine by analysis. The complete analysis of brandy 
is intended to meet that case entirely. 

Q. How do you meet that ? 

A. No admixture made to pure Cognac brandy can escape detection in 
analysis. I pointed out the object of analysis and stated that we did meet 
these points in analysis. In regard to the adding of grape brandy, the most 
volatile have not the same proportion as those from pure Cognac brandy, and 
we are able to determine very accurately the matured brandy. 

Q. You are enabled to determine the age ? 

A. Not the age, but the maturity ; for it is possible to mature a brandy 
-under certain conditions in a short period of time as well as in a greater 
length of time. 

Q. Can you determine the purity of brandy or other spirits, when mixed 
to the the same extent, say twenty-five per cent., with another and inferior 
quality of wine? 



APPENDIX. 723 

A. Very easily. 

Q. That can be done ? 

A. It is almost daily done, sir. 

Q. Can you by analysis determine the value of the mixture of new wine 
with old wine of the same origin ? 

A. We can determine that the wine has been mixed. The money value 
is a matter dependent upon the market. We do not depend on that exactly, 
but we can determine whether old wine is mixed with new. 

Q. Can you determine the age of the wine ? 

A. Not in years, but in maturity. 

Q. Its apparent maturity ? 

A. Yes, sir; the manufacturers of spirits have a mode of maturing their 
wines in a shorter time than formerly. 

Q. Without affecting the market value ? 

A. O, no, sir. 

Q. Do you say that the maturity is the same ? 

A. I say that if a cask of wine which formerly required six years to 
mature, is matured now in a shorter time to the same extent, it would sell for 
the same value. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Then you mean to say that you can tell by analysis 
all these conditions which are necessary to affect the value as a marketable 
commodity ? 

A. Not to apply a money value to them. We speak here of the value of 
a beverage as compared with pure brandy, or a high quality of wine. 

Q. Then aside from the state of the market 

A . I confine my observations to the value as a matured or immatured 
wine. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Then you do not go so far as to say that by 
analysis you can discover these various facts which go very far to determine 
the value of the article as a marketable commodity ? 

A . We can determine these facts ; and we can determine the value of a 
wine, founded on its maturity. 

Q. You have an idea of value, and perhaps the consumer may have 
another idea of value ? 

A. I take the consumer's idea of value. But as regards the money price, 
that you know, is regulated by legislative action, but it has a certain connec- 
tion with the quality. We find in the market wines that are not valued so 
high as matured wines, but are more valuable as commodities, which have 
an artificial consumption. 

Q. Suppose we had free trade in wines between this country and Europe, 
could you then distinguish by analysis one grade and boquet of wine from 
another, to the extent of making that analysis a test by which a merchant or 
a consumer could buy and sell ? 

A. The observation in regard to the condition is applied to what is really 
determined in the laboratory. These are separate matters. I do not think 
they can be included at all. 

Q. That is exactly what I want to get at. 



724 APPENDIX. 

A. What we determine positively in the laboratory, does not refer to the 
value of the commodity. The grade of these wines, the value of one compared 
with another one of the same kind, — that is, that it should be higher or lower, 
but of the same wine, — does not come into the laboratory at all. But it has 
its influence with purchasers, where it is found in the lower prices. But that 
is a matter for the merchant and not for the chemist. 

Q. Therefore the analysis can only be one means of assisting a commercial 
man in making up his own intelligent judgment, in doing which he has got to 
consider other things than this which you can tell him ? 

Q. I do not feel that that is so. The analysis, carefully conducted, is, as I 
have said, to determine the value of the quality they use. The merchant has 
other influences on his mind in regard to prices. These we do not enter into 
at all. 

Q. Then what you mean by that is this, if I understand you correctly, 
that it does not make any difference for medicinal purposes whether you use 
one kind or grade or stripe, if so be it is what you call pure brandy, or is, to 
a certain extent, made up from it ? 

A. No such deduction is to be drawn. 

Q. Then be kind enough to state what point among the various positions 
you do take ? 

A. The position which can be taken, and which can be maintained exper- 
imentally is, that matured wines have a higher value, — and a much higher 
value, — than the immatured spirits. Those for medicinal purposes are valued ; 
and they are valued in proportion to the maturity ; for there are certain prin- 
ciples produced in the wines and brandies, which are of a high character, 
which are not produced in the direct distillation. As an illustration of that, a 
brandy which is valued to-day at two dollars may, after a few years, be 
valued at eight dollars, having added all that amount in price. We take this 
into the laboratory, and we find that there have been certain chemical 
changes ; we find the production of a body for which we pay a high price. 
It is so in the case of wines. Those wines in which a certain aroma is j)ro- 
cured, have a very high value. And we find a wine to be highly aromatic 
which has been well matured. This connection between price and quality, is 
determined in the laboratory. But in regard to medical practice, or as to the 
taking of spirit in any way, I wish to be understood as stating distinctly that 
these wines which are matured, have a very great difference in their effect 
upon the system from those which are immatured. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) I understand you that maturity does not depend upon 
age? 

A. No, sir; because the manufacturers are able to mature their wines 
quicker than formerly. Formerly it would be a matter of the voyage : now it 
is a matter of a warm store-house. Maturity is insured in a much shorter 
time. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you aware that it is a quality of some dis- 
tilled spirits that they are better for being new ? 

A. No, sir, I do not ; and I doubt its expression in any form. 

Q. Have you never heard of that ? 



APPENDIX. 725 

A. When the exhibition of fusel oil is desired, new spirits are sometimes 
employed. But on the other side, if the oil is taken and placed in water, the 
same results would be obtained, without the aid of spirits. 

Q. Then, if I understand you correctly, it would be possible for us to 
organize a system of inspection of liquor throughout the Commonwealth, by 
which the present selling of liquor, either by license or otherwise, could be 
subjected to supervision to an extent which would reasonably secure the 
people from being imposed upon ? 

A. I think that might be done. 

Q. There is no scientific difficulty in the way ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. ^Vhen you examine liquors and analyze liquors for the State Agency 
of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, do you go to the receptacle of the 
Agency, and examine all the casks, barrels, hogsheads, or packages in bulk, 
.or do you receive at your laboratory a little bottle or vial, containing a sample, 
and analyze that ? 

A. Where the number of packages is large, I take a certain proportion 
from different portions. 

Q. Do you mean to say that you go yourself? 

A. I go myself. 

Q. Dipping in here and there ? 

A. Suppose a case of twenty barrels of New England rum. It is well 
known that that New England rum was filled into the barrels from one 
receptacle. Samples are taken from every seven or eight barrels. The 
barrels are generally the most defective. From these the samples are taken 
by myself and taken to the laboratory in quantities sufficient. There are some 
cases at the Custom House where the barrels are so piled upon each other 
that it is almost impossible to get at the lower tier. Then the higher tier is 
taken. 

Q. Do you pursue a similar course in regard to imported liquors ? 

A. It is the same, sir. I spoke of going to the Custom House. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You made an incidental reference, in answering 
a question in the cross-examination, to fusel oil. Is that easily separated 
from alcoholic preparations, so as to be employed without alcoholic spirits ? 

A. Yes, sir, it is constantly done, and constantly for sale. 

Q. Is it on account of the fusel oil that these alcoholic preparations are 
used in the cases which have been alluded to ? 

A. That is, is that the reason why impure spirits are selected ? 

Q. My question was upon this point. I understand it to have been testi- 
fied that new spirits are chosen on account of the fusel oil being contained in 
greater proportion. Now I would like to inquire whether it is on account of 
the fusel oil that these alcoholic preparations are used ? 

A. That is the agent sought in the prescription. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you understand that that is what Dr. Jackson 
gave alcoholic stimulants to little children for, when they were in different 
stages of dentition ? 

A . I do not know what he gave it for. I state from my own knowledge 
that it is a common resort, and physicians have applied to me in relation to 



726 APPENDIX. 

this point. I state, therefore, that they do use the new spirits in consequence 
of the fusel oil in large proportions, when they prescribe for pulmonary com- 
plaints ; and that every educated physician knows that the effect is the same 
when placed in water. 

Q. Do you mean to say that medical men do not prescribe any alcohol 
"because it is in itself advantageous ? 

A. No, sir; but the fusel oil produces the same effect when mixed with 
water. 

Testimony of Hon. Woodbury Davis. 
Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You reside in Portland ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you resided there ? 

A. I have resided there between eleven and twelve years. 

Q. Did you reside in Maine before that ? 

A. I have always resided in Maine. 

Q. You have been an interested observer of the movement of the temper- 
ance cause, and of the temperance laws of your State, I suppose ? 

A. I have been connected somewhat with the temperance cause from my 
boyhood, I may say, and through all my active life. 

Q. We hear of the Maine Law a good deal. That was a strict prohibitory 
law, I believe. Was that the first prohibitory law of Maine ? 

A. The laws of Maine upon this subject are rather the result of growth 
with constant additions, than otherwise, and can hardly be said to be embodied 
in any one statute. Since twenty years ago, or nearly that time, they have 
grown up into their present system, and as they now are. 

Q. Suppose you give us the history of prohibitory legislation in Maine ? 

A. The question- of legislating upon this subject was first brought before 
our Legislature, in definite form, as early as 1837 or 1838. The matter was 
at that time referred to a special committee of the Legislature, of which 
General Appleton, then of Portland, was chairman. The committee took up 
the subject and went into a critical examination, and made quite an elaborate 
report on that subject, recommending a change of legislative movement for 
the suppression instead of the regulation of the traffic — not at that time 
reporting any statute, not at that time embodying any definite idea, but 
recommending as an object of legislation to suppress the traffic instead of 
regulating it. 

Q. How long ago was that ? 

A. It was as early as 1837 or 1838. I do not remember the precise year, 
I know it was as early as that. It did not result, however, in any definite 
legislation at that time. The matter continued to be agitated from that time 
forward, without any definite legislation — without any legislation, in fact, 
except some Acts, from time to time, changing the license system, by making 
it more stringent and restricting the authorized sale under it. It was not 
until 1846 that this effort to change the legislation from the license principle 
to the prohibitory principle, was embodied in any form. In 1846 it was for 
the first time done. By the statute of 1846, all sales of spirituous liquors, 
except for medicines and the arts, were entirely prohibited. Provision was 



APPENDIX. 727 

made by that Act for the appointment of persons to sell in the various towns, 
and they proved more extensive than they subsequently were by statute. 
The statute of 1846 was a prohibitory law, based upon the same principle 
and going to the same extent in its object as the subsequent laws have done. 

Q. That was a number of years prior to the enactment of what is techni- 
cally called the Maine Law, was it not ? 

A. The Act of 1846 was in operation for five years without any change 
in the law. That embraced no process for certain seizures, and the penalties 
were very different from those subsequently provided. It authorized any 
person to sue for the penalties in his own name and right, and provided 
various machineries for its enforcement, which were in the small towns 
employed to a great extent throughout the State during the five following 
years — the more active temperance men in the State all the time contending 
for a more stringent law, and for more stringent provision for its enforcement. 

Q. Then the difference between the law of 1840 and what is technically 
termed the Maine Law, was chiefly, if not entirely, in its penalties, was it 
not? 

A . It provided for more authorized to sell than the subsequent law. Its 
penalties were different. It contained no provision for the search of places 
where liquor was sold, nor for the seizures of liquors. In these three respects 
it differed from the subsequent statute. 

Q. Then the law of 1846 authorized no persons to sell, and those who did 
it were to do it exclusively for medicinal and mechanical purposes, and not 
for beverages ? 

A. That was the purpose. 

Q. When was the next law ? 

A. That was followed by what is technically known as the Maine Law, in 
1851. 

Q. We should like to have you tell us pretty fully how that law has been 
enforced in Maine. There has been a good deal of difference on that point, 
you have observed. We would like to have you give an accurate account of 
it, so far as you may be able ? 

A. The law of 1846, as I have already observed, was enforced very exten- 
sively in the former towns — not so extensively, by any means, in the larger 
towns and cities. The law of 1851 was for several years enforced generally 
throughout the State, not without exceptions, but very generally, (and the 
question of closing up all public places of sales of liquor.) 

Q. For how long a time was it so enforced ? 

A. It was enforced, perhaps, more and more vigorously from 1851 to 1855. 
During that period there were additions made to the law to increase its work- 
ing power, as it was claimed. Changes were made in the law for that purpose 
from 1851 to 1855. It probably never was enforced any more vigorously than 
it was from 1851 to 1855, nor any more extensively than it was then. 

Q. You say the public places of sale were broken up. What real effect did 
that have upon the amount of liquor consumed in Maine as a beverage, in 
your judgment? 

A. I, of course, have no means of knowing. I have no personal knowl- 
edge in regard to that. 



728 APPENDIX. 

Q. Your j udgment, so far as you can form an opinion, which you would 
consider a reasonable opinion ? 

A. I have no question that its result was to diminish very largely the 
amount of intoxication. My opinion would be, if it would be allowed, that it 
diminished very largely the use of liquors. And I ought to state, in connec- 
tion with that, that the basis of that opinion is that of visible evidence of the 
use of liquors. Some might not infer the one from the other. I only wish to 
be understood, that the consumption of liquors was very largely diminished 
and my opinion is based simply on the fact that the external evidence of the 
use of liquors has very largely diminished ; and I have my opinion upon that 
fact. 

Q. You say that was enforced up to 1855, very rigidly and quite exten- 
sively. Was it not repealed in 1856 ? 

A. It was repealed in 1856, and substantially a license law was substituted 
in its stead. 

Q. Well, that license law was repealed a year after, and substantially the 
old law reinstated ? 

A. It was. 

Q. What was the operation of that license law while it was in existence ? 

A. I think it was not enforced to any extent. 

Q. Do you remember how many they licensed in Portland, for instance ? 

A. I do not remember how many were licensed. I simply know one gen- 
eral fact, that wherever I went throughout the State in that period the open 
sale of liquors was generally resumed, and the enforcement of the law was 
scarcely known. 

Q. Of the license law ? 

A. Of the license law. There would be an occasional prosecution under 
it. 

Q. After the prohibitory law was reinstated, was that put in force quite 
generally ? 

A. It was generally enforced as it was before, but I think not so thoroughly 
nor so extensively as it had been before it was repealed. 

Q. But quite extensively ? 

A. It was. The law which was enacted in 1857 went into operation in 
January, 1858 ; and it at once began to be enforced, and it has been enforced 
ever since in the small towns, with some exceptions of course, but generally 
in the small towns, and quite extensively in the larger towns. 

Q. Was there a suspension in the enforcement of the law, to some extent, 
during the war ? 

A. I think there was, throughout the State, in the large places, and the 
agitation incident to the war commenced two or three years after the 
law was re-enacted, before the machinery was in full force again. Other sub- 
jects attracted the public attention. The other matters upon which men dif- 
fered were allowed to lie in abeyance during the progress of the war. So far 
as I know, I judge it to have been so generally throughout the State. 

Q. During this period in which the law was enforced, was there a diminu- 
tion in the statistics of pauperage and crime ? 



APPENDIX. 729 

A. It was so under that system, but my observation would not extend 
beyond a few of the larger places in that particular. It was so in Portland, 
Bangor, Belfast, and places where my own observation led me to lorm an 
opinion. 

Q. Did the people of Maine ever vote upon that ? 

A. When it was re-enacted in 1857, the friends of the law chose to submit 
it to the popular vote and it Avas done ; the vote being taken, I think in the 
month of June, in the summer season, not at the time when there was any 
election, when that was the only matter in which the people were called out. 
It was enacted by the Legislature in order to avoid any question about the 
right of the matter, that it was positively to go into effect on a certain day ; 
and it was submitted with the provision that if the majority of the voters did 
not vote in favor of it, that it should be thereby considered as repealed. I do 
not use the precise language, but that was the provision substantially. 

Q. It has been stated here on high authority, that it was never the judg- 
ment of the people of Maine. I would like to know the fact on that subject, 
if you please. 

A . I have not the precise vote. Those voting in favor of the law accord- 
ing to my recollection, numbered between twenty-eight and twenty-nine 
thousand. The number of those voting against it I cannot state, but the 
number was very small, in comparison ; but I have not the figures, so as to 
give the vote as it stood. 

Q. The vote in the affirmative was a number of times larger than that in 
the negative ? 

A. It was five or six times as large as the number of those who voted 
against it, according to my recollection. I did not anticipate the question, I 
have not prepared myself with the figures. 

Q. To what extent is the law enforced there now ? 

A. It has been very generally enforced in the State. I mean by that, 
that it is enforced in the larger part of the cities and towns of the State ; a 
very much larger part, so that the towns wherein it is not enforced are the 
exceptions. 

Q. Is there much moral effort in Maine, now, on the subject of temperance ? 

A. I do not know that I precisely understand your question. 

Q. Are there sermons on the subject, enforcing the duty of practising 
temperance or total abstinence ? 

A. The matter is one which is being discussed extensively, and always has 
been, in the pulpit and by the press, — always has been, excepting in the years 
when the public mind was taken up with the question of rebellion. 

Q. Has there not been a change effected in the last Legislature in the 
law? 

A. There has been. 

Q. What was it, if you please ? 

A. The Legislature, the session of which has recently closed, established 
a State Constabulary system by an Act copied substantially from the Massa- 
chusetts Act. 

Q. And increasing the penalties also ? 
92 



730 APPENDIX. 

A. They also passed a new Act increasing the penalties, so that every viola- 
tion of the present law is to be punished by imprisonment, the length of the 
term varying from thirty days to six months. 

Q. Do you recollect the vote of the Legislature upon the test question ? 

A. The Constabulary Act passed. I do not remember the precise vote*, 
but by a vote I think of ten in favor, to one against it. 

Q. You had some Democratic votes, of course ? 

Q. I do not know how that was. The Act increasing penalties and mak- 
ing offences of every grade punishable, was passed by a very much larger 
majority, three-fourths, I think, although I have not the figures with me ; but 
that, like the initiatory Act was submitted to the people for adoption, and is 
not to go into effect unless it is sustained by the popular vote on the first 
Monday in June, I think. 

Q. Still I should like to know what, in your opinion, that vote will be ? 

A. I have no doubt in regard to the result, and my opinion would be based 
upon certain facts within my knowledge or substantially the same ; but that the 
vote on the amendatory question will be substantially sustained by the popular 
vote, by a large majority, as decisive as the original vote, I have no doubt. 

Q. Four or five times as large ? 

A. I have no doubt that that will be the result. 

Q. Is not that a very small vote, compared to the number of voters in the 
State ? 

A. The vote, I think, in the recent election of both political parties, was 
between eighty and ninety thousand. I should think that not more than one- 
third part of the voters of the State voted affirmatively for the law. The 
vote was taken at a certain season of the year when it would be likely to be 
small, and being on the day when there was nothing else to be voted for, of 
course it would be so to some extent. It is a matter of which any one could 
form an opinion for himself as to the reason. 

Q. Was it not generally understood what the vote would be, and would 
not that necessarily prevent many from coming up ? 

A. I do not think it was so certain at that time as it is now. The year 
before the law had been repealed by a combination of influences that resulted 
in that ; and it was not so certain what the public sentiment of the people of 
the State would be as it is now. Still I think the friends of temperance at 
that time felt certain of the result. In regard to the amendments which are 
to be submitted to the people, my opinion would be based in fact upon the 
action of the people in different localities where that question has been 
brought in, and in cities and large towns, where the law has been vigor- 
ously enforced. At the city election in Bangor, this question was made 
a test question at the recent election ; and the friends of the prohibitory law 
re-elected their mayor, who has been for years a practical working prohibi- 
tionist. They re-elected him by a large majority, notwithstanding an oppo- 
nent of the same political party was run against him. 

Q. That opponent got the Democratic votes, I suppose ? 

A. I cannot say as to that ; I simply know the fact that the present mayor 
was elected. I know that the opponent was a man whom I know equally 
well, and a man of the same political party, and yet that the other candidate 



APPENDIX. 731 

•was elected by a large majority. In Portland, during the war, our mayor 
was a man not specially interested in the prohibitory law ; but I was a mem- 
ber of the same party that assisted in electing him, year after year, by com- 
mon consent, we thinking it better not to make that a test question during 
the rebellion. After the war was closed, instead of re-electing him, a year 
ago this Spring the friends of temperance selected a man who was a well- 
known prohibitionist, and elected him by a large majority ; but during the 
past year, the law has been very thoroughly enforced, by degrees, in Port- 
land. There have been three or four hundred cases of search and seizure 
during the past year, and several thousand dollars have been paid into the 
municipal court, without regard to the other cases. All the places of sale 
known, except, perhaps, some apothecaries, have been searched during the 
year ; and the mayor, and the police acting under him, have in this way 
enforced the law. The question being substantially a test question, he was 
elected this Spring with an increased majority. The same is true in other 
cities, and these facts bring me to the conclusion, together with other facts 
within my knowledge, that the people will, by a very large majority, sustain 
the amendment to the present law. 

Q. Has it not got to be, on the whole, understood by friends and foes, that 
prohibition is the settled policy of Maine, not to be uprooted until there is a 
very great change in public opinion ? 

A. I think it is generally understood that this is the established policy of 
the State. A large number of the larger towns in the State, — such towns as 
Waterville and Kennebunk, embracing the seaboard towns that are not 
cities, and the larger class of towns, within my personal knowledge, have 
taken up the question of enforcing the law and instructed their officers to do 
it at the public expense ; and the matter is being carried very generally in 
that way. Notwithstanding that, I ought to say that there are towns in the 
State, both large and small, in which the law is not enforced. 

Q. That led to the agitation of the Constabulary system, I suppose ? 

A . I have no doubt that that was the reason. 

Q. "We have had a misnomer here, I must say, in a clergyman appearing 
in favor of the license law. What is your opinion as to the views of the 
clergy in your city ? 

A. I do not know of any clergyman in our city, with the exception of two 
or three Roman Catholic clergymen, who are opposed to our prohibitory law. 
I would not wish to be understood to say that there are not others, but I do 
not know of any. 

Q. AVhat is the general sentiment of public men, of leading men, men in 
public life, city and town officers, etc. ? 

A. That, I suppose, would be indicated by the adoption of the Constabu- 
lary Act by our Legislature. I was with a committee in preparing their Acts, 
and associated with the members of the Legislature of both branches, with a 
very large number of whom I had a personal acquaintance. Of course there 
are some exceptions ; but the great body of that class of men in the State, in 
the Republican party, are in favor of the prohibitory law. 

Q. Had you any particular difficulty in securing convictions in your State, 
or juries dissenting where the facts are clearly proved ? 



732 APPENDIX. 

A. There are sometimes cases of disagreement. 

Q. Cases -where the facts are all plain and they stand out from their dislike 
of the law, insisting on their right to judge of the law, etc. ? 

A. I think cases of disagreement, under these circumstances, are rare, but 
they do sometimes occur. For nearly ten years I had charge of the criminal 
courts as well as the civil. Being on the bench, I was engaged every year, to 
a greater or less extent, in the trials of such cases as came into the Supreme 
Court. In those counties where they have enforced the law the most, there is 
less danger of disagreement ; and there would sometimes be cases of disagree- 
ment where the evidence was conclusive (as I believe,) and satisfactory. I 
have often known such cases, where there was a disagreement, to stand until 
the next term, and a conviction would follow on the second trial. 

Q. Do they allow liquor-sellers to sit on the jury ? 

A. We have a rule by which no person engaged in the sale of liquor shall 
sit in such cases as a juror; so that if it appear by the answers or otherwise 
that he is a dealer in liquors, he is excluded. 

Q. You consider, as a jurist, that it is. a wise and proper difference, I 
suppose ? 

A. I personally have no doubt in regard to that. It would be a question 
that would hardly seem to admit of any doubt. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You were inquired of in reference to the license 
law — I mean the Neal Dow law ? 

A. That was the law of 1851. Mr. Dow has been active in securing other 
laws, but that was more particularly connected with his name. 

Q. Was the consequent legislation in passing that law understood to be in 
favor of it, or was a majority brought to bear upon it by a combination of 
interests or by political considerations ? 

A. My own opinion would be, that the majority of the Legislature that 
originally enacted that law, so to speak, did not have faith in it. It was 
enacted in 1851, before the present parties, as they now stand, were organized, 
and when the Democratic party had the majority in that State ; but I should, 
perhaps, say this : that it was enacted as- the result of the agitation on this 
subject by leading temperance men, who were influential men in both parties 5 
and my view would be, that one portion of the Legislature was strongly in 
favor and the other portion of the Legislature did not exactly have faith, but 
was willing to say to those of us who wanted it, (and I was one of those 
who wanted it,) we are willing you should take this and try it. 

Q. So far as this is concerned, from their acts, it is not an indication of 
where the sentiment of the majority of the people was. There may have 
been a majority voting for it, but was that Act itself a sure indication of what 
the opinion of the people was ? 

A . I think it was a sure indication that the sentiment of the people was in 
favor of having a law for suppressing the sale of intoxicating liquors, but as 
to whether this particular mode was considered the best, I think it was an 
experiment. 

Q. What is the number of legal voters in the State of Maine ? 

A. It is now one hundred and ten thousand, more or less ? 

Q. At the time that this was submitted to the people, what was the number ? 



APPENDIX. 733 

A. It must have been ten thousand less, I should judge, than now ; though 
I should not wish to be understood as stating very nearly. 

Q. So far as the opinion of the people is concerned, there was a vote of 
about twenty-eight thousand, was there ? 

A. That was about the number, I think ; between twenty-eight and 
twenty-nine thousand. I only speak from recollection. 

Q. We can go, then, no farther on that, than to say that the only action of 
the people of Maine having an opportunity to record their votes, on what is 
known as the Maine Law, was a vote of twenty-eight or twenty-nine thousand 
in favor of the law, out of one hundred thousand voters. I do not ask for 
opinion, but any action expressed by the people when they had an opportu- 
nity to express it, either yea or nay, without any other opinion connected 
with it. Have you any other instances, except this case of twenty-eight or 
twenty-nine thousand out of a hundred thousand ? 

A. If you mean to ask whether it has entered into our popular elections — 
Q. No, sir ; I understand that ; but where the people have had an oppor- 
tunity of expressing their opinion, and where that was the only principle ? 
A. There has been no other popular vote on that subject. 
Q. While we all know that in a popular election a great many other mat- 
ters may come in, personal dislikes and the like, is that a fair test of the public 
sentiment on a particular law where the vote is yea or nay ? 

A. I should, perhaps, state a fact which others know as well as myself, 
that since 1856, when there was a reaction that lasted but one year, the party 
known as the Republican party have had a very large majority in our State 
always. In connection with that, the only way in which I could answer your 
question would be this : that no man could have received a nomination from 
that party who was not known to be favorable to the prohibitory law. 

Q. And less than a majority of the people and less than a majority of the 
party, might, if they were disposed, secure the nomination of any man ? 
A. It might be done. 

Q. I would inquire whether the use of liquor having diminished, you infer 
it if I understand you aright, from the closing of the open places of sale ? I 
understood you to answer a question by Mr. Spooner, that you thought that 
the use of intoxicating liquor was diminished ? 
A. I expressed such an opinion. 

Q. Was that opinion based chiefly on the fact that within your observa- 
tion, public places of sale seem to be closed? 

A. It was only in part upon that ; perhaps less upon that than other facts. 
There is very much less indication in the streets and a very much less number 
of arrests in our city ; and in all these evidences where there is any public 
manifestation, these public manifestations were very largely diminished. 
Q. Do you know anything about the secret sale ? 
A. I do not. 

Q. There are a portion of the places which are apparently closed. I would 
inquire whether there are other portions of the State in which it continues ? 
A. There are some towns in the State where the public sale is continued, 
the number yet being large enough. There have always, I think, been some 
places. 



734 APPENDIX. 

Q. Now, in regard to the private or secret sale, have you any means of 
judging how far that is carried on, or whether it is discontinued ? 

A. I have no doubt that there has always been, since the law was enforced, 
a secret sale of liquors to a certain extent. The very fact that it is secret, 
of course, would prevent any one who is not himself a purchaser, from 
forming an opinion as to the extent of it. 

Q. Really, then, one cannot tell what the amount of that sale is, very 
well? 

A. During the ten years of my official life my duties have led me into all 
parts of the State, generally stopping at hotels, and stopping at hotels where, 
if sold at all, of course it was sold secretly, and all persons could form some 
opinion, quite indefinite, but yet some opinion as to the sale of it. 

Q. In large places was it or not a question that there were secret places in 
all the hotels where it could be got ? 

A. It has. always been understood that there were places where it could 
be purchased ; and it has not been an uncommon thing for the police in our 
cities to ferret out such places, and have those who had charge of them pros- 
ecuted and convicted. 

Q. Is there any difficulty in anybody in the State of Maine at the present 
time, who desires, getting intoxicating liquors as a beverage ? 

A. There is a very large number of towns' in the State where it would be 
impossible to get it — a very large number, and some of them large towns. In 
our cities and in a large number of the large towns, I have no doubt that 
there are places where persons can succeed in getting liquors. 

Q. Can they not get them now as well as ever ? Is there any difficulty 
in their obtaining them, if they wish to get them ? 

A . I can hardly state anything in addition to what I have stated, that I 
have no doubt that in places like Portland, Bangor and other places, persons 
who want liquors can obtain them. 

Q. Is there any difficulty in a gentleman going from Massachusetts to any 
of the hotels in Portland, and getting liquor if he wants it ? 

A. That is a question that I am not able to answer. I have no means of 
knowing about it. Perhaps I ought to say this ; if not directly in answer to 
that, that my opinion is that a gentleman putting up at most of our hotels 
who ordered a bottle of wine sent to his room, could have it done, while it 
would be perhaps impossible to get it in any other way. 

Q. From your observation in your course as a public man, (and I have 
known it for a long time to be a consistent one), I would like your opinion 
whether under the operation of your legislation any persons in the habit of 
drunkenness or persons in the habit of drinking, though not as a beverage, 
have, from the mere operation of your legislation, been reclaimed, or whether 
moderate drinkers have been induced to give it up altogether ? 

A. If you ask my opinion upon that matter I can give it. 

Q. Yes, sir, you can do no more than to give your opinion. 

A. My opinion has been from the first and has been continually strength- 
ened by my observation and personal connection with the enforcement of the 
law, that one of the most valuable results of it is, it has an effect on the 
public sentiment in making it disreputable to drink, and in restraining men 



APPENDIX. 735 

from a practice in which they could not indulge except by doing it secretly, 
which they do not like to do ; and, therefore, aside from its direct influence 
perhaps its most valuable work was on the point you suggested, making the 
use of liquor disreputable and thereby restraining the young from the habit. 

Q. Do you think it has had any effect upon the personal habits of the 
people in regard to the use of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I think the law alone with us has had the effect to make the use of 
liquors in a certain sense so unpopular, that whereas it was once common to 
have wines at social gatherings and parties, creating a temptation to the 
young, and others, now it is a thing almost unknown. 

Q. Since 1851 when the law was passed, is there less ? 

A. I think there is very much less. 

Q. And yet there is not a hotel in Maine, where if a person goes and 
orders a bottle of wine, he could not get it ? 

A. There are a large number of hotels in Maine. 

Q. Well, in Portland, the leading hotels ? 

A. One of our hotels, within a week, has come out with an advertisement 
that there will hereafter be no sale of liquors. It may be because they have 
been prosecuted several times through the Winter ; but they now advertise as 
a strictly temperance hotel. 

Q. Would you think that a system of legislation that should close up the 
public bars, and yet permit hotels to furnish it to their guests, would be objec- 
tionable ? 

A. My opinion would be that it would be conceding the whole ground 
upon which temperance stands. 

Q. It might be conceding the theory; but how would it be as to putting 
the matter into effect ? 

A. I do not speak of it simply as theory, because theory, disconnected 
from practical working, is not of much value. The mere fact that guests, in 
violation of the law, can have a bottle of wine sent to them at their rooms if 
they want, perhaps would have no serious influence upon the community in a 
temperance point of view. But the fact that the law allowed that to be done 
would take the basis out of all other temperance working, in my judgment. 

Q. Then you will not concede the privilege to an individual ? 

A. I should regret very much if any one had not the privilege of deciding 
that for himself. 

Q. Well, does not this law deprive him of that ? 

A . I am aware of no provision of the law against a person's having a bot- 
tle of wine for his dinner, if he can get it.. 

Q. You think it is a thing that he has a right to decide upon ? 

A. I think that if he owns the bottle of wine, the question whether he 
shall use it or not, is a question entirely for his own decision. 

Q. Is it right to use it ? 

A . I suppose you use the word right in two different senses. 

Q. I mean the simple right. Is there anything wrong in using it for his 
dinner, calling for the interposition of a system of legislation. Is" there such 
a wrong in a man's using at dinner a glass of wine, as to call for an Act of 
legislation to prevent it ? 



736 APPENDIX. 

A. If you speak of the simple guilt of the act, in my judgment it would 
be wrong for a man to use liquors in that way on account of the influence of 
example, which would lead others, he knows not how many others, to do the 
same thing, and enter upon a course of indulgence, which, while he might 
save himself, they might be led on to their ruin. 

Q. Do you consider it a moral sin ? 

A . I think it is a sin for a man to set an example for the community, 
which will result in great public injury. 

Q. Do you believe there is any difficulty in the enforcement of a law that 
is based upon a principle which a large portion of the community do not sub- 
scribe to ? 

A. I have no doubt, from my observation, that a law which meets with 
universal assent, as most of our criminal laws do, can be enforced more easily 
than any law which does not meet with such assent. The general principle, I 
have no doubt, is true, that the more universally a law agrees with the public 
sentiment, the more easily it is enforced. 

Q. Will there not always, in your opinion, be great difficulty in enforcing 
laws that are contrary to the public judgment ? I am not saying of the 
majority, but of a very large minority of the people? 

A. The question seems to me to involve the same principle as before. In 
proportion to the number of those who disagree to the principle of the law, in 
that proportion there will be difficulty in enforcing it ; but if the law itself is 
based on an intrinsically right principle, the very enforcement of it tends to 
bring the public sentiment up to the sentiment of the law, and make it more 
and more easy to carry it out. 

Q. Do you think that any law, by the mere majority of the legal voters 
approving of the principle upon which it is based, while a large minority dis- 
approve of it, can be enforced to any particular benefit ? 

A. I take it to be well known, that there are certain laws which come into 
existence by the agitation which precedes a popular verdict in their favor ; 
and there is a time when the majority is opposed to it. And it is agitated 
until the principle gets up to secure a majority, and it then assumes a form 
of law. If a majority is small, it is difficult at first to execute it ; and 
the difficulty is in proportion to the number who are opposed to it ; and the 
difficulty in the execution of any law, in my judgment, lies in the fact that, 
if it is right, and commends itself to the people, it will not only work itself up 
to secure a majority, but it will, in time, work itself up to have a preponder- 
ating influence in the community. 

Q. And the question lies in the idea whether the law is a proper law or 
not, does it not ? 

A. Whether the object to be secured is a good one or a bad one, is the 
phraseology I used. 

Q. The end does not always justify the means, does it ? 

A. The end, and the principle underlying it, however, are the same if 
they are good. 

Q. But if the principle underlying it is a wrong one, would you as judge 
or as legislator advise the passage of a law the principle of which could not be 
executed, though the end aimed at might be a good one ? 



APPENDIX. 737 

A. It is rather hazardous to give opinion on specific questions of that 
kind. 

Q. If you were convinced that the underlying principles of such a law 
were unsound and wrong, would you feel at liberty to base a criminal law 
upon such principles, although the end aimed at by the law is good ? 

A. I confess that I do not know what you mean by "underlying" 
principles. 

Q. By that I mean the principle upon which the law is based. This law 
assumes that certain practices are so wicked, as to require the interposition of 
legislative power ? 

A. To answer that question, I should have to say that the law assumes 
that the use of intoxicating liquor is productive of evil, and that therefore the 
traffic ought to be suppressed. That I would call an underlying principle. 

Q. Suppose that the law contains no such a principle as that ? 

A. Every law proposes some object to be attained; the object to be 
attained here, is the suppression of the traffic in liquor, then comes a question 
in regard to the proper means by which to attain that object. The end and 
the means, it seems to me, embrace the whole. Therefore I do not quite 
understand what you mean by " underlying principle." 

Q. If every man sold liquor, you would not think that they ought to be 
hung? 

A. I have never come to that conclusion. I would make the law the 
wisest and best that could be made to secure the end. 

Testimony of Rev. Samuel T. Seelye. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I would like to have your opinion as to the 
expediency and propriety of the present liquor law as compared with the 
license system which will license the sale of intoxicating liquors for the 
purpose of a beverage ? 

A. My opinion is, sir, very clearly and decidedly in favor of the prohib- 
itory law, greatly preferring it to a license law, and not only greatly preferring 
it, but perfectly abhorring the principle of license as made the basis of law. 

Q. The evils of the traffic are so great that you think it would not do to 
give a legal sanction to it ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. And thereby substantially assert that a bad practice is a right one ? 

A. It is my opinion, and the opinion of very many with whom I am asso- 
ciated, that to license in any degree the traffic in intoxicating liquors would 
be a wrong of which this Commonwealth ought not to be guilty. I feel that 
the principle upon which the prohibitory law is based is a right principle. It 
seeks the entire suppression of the traffic in intoxicating drinks, and we all 
know the evils that result from that traffic. The only question I have ever 
heard mooted with reference to the law is, whether it can be enforced. The 
righteousness of the prohibitory principle is acknowledged even by the advo- 
cates of a license law. A license law is entirely prohibitory to all who are 
not licensed. If the principle of prohibition is not right in legislation then 
the license law cannot be right, for the advocates of that law hold on to that 
principle very strenuously ; and their argument at the present day in favor of 
93 



738 APPENDIX. 

a license law is, that it is going to be so fearfully stringent that it will restrain 
and limit a great deal of the traffic in intoxicating drinks. Now, sir, I believe 
that is all moonshine. No such results can follow. Here is the reason. 
Behind this prohibitory law, upholding it, sustaining it and enforcing it, is the 
Christian sentiment of this Commonwealth. This law is prayed for in most 
of our churches, if not in all. It is prayed for in thousands of family altars of 
this Commonwealth. What other law is there upon our statute book that is 
so supported by the religious, Christian sentiment of the people as this ? And 
what Christian man ever did or ever would pray for the enforcement of a 
license law ? There would not be a prayer behind it ; and I say that if you 
take away this prop upon which the prohibitory law rests for its support, and 
this mighty power which is behind it for its enforcement — if you give up the 
principle of prohibition, you admit that the traffic in intoxicating drinks 
cannot be regulated and restricted, as well as admit that it cannot be sup- 
pressed. I am sure that this law can be enforced. In Hampshire County it 
is now being enforced. In the town of Easthampton it has been enforced, 
and it will be enforced. There is not a place in that town where a glass of 
anything that can intoxicate can be purchased, neither ale nor cider. We 
have shut up every liquor-shop, and we feel, as our district-attorney said, 
that since we have the decisions of the United States Court in favor of this 
law, the law Avorks like a charm. It was not until within a few weeks that 
the rumsellers in Hampshire County knew that they were liable to be sent to 
jail at the first trial. The temperance men did not know it. They have just 
learned it, and we feel now that the law is what we want. Yesterday, at the 
annual town meeting in Easthampton, when the town hall was filled with 
voters, a resolution was offered remonstrating against the petition of the Hon. 
Alpheus Hardy and others for a license law, and urging the Legislature to do 
nothing with our prohibitory law excepting to make it more stringent. I had 
the honor of standing up before that well-filled hall, crowded indeed it was, 
and advocating those resolutions, and my soul was thrilled as I looked over 
that audience and saw what I had not seen since the war. There was fire in 
those men's eyes. There was a determination written in their countenances, 
showing a spirit that I had not seen since the war closed. What was the 
result ? A vote was taken by standing, and that vote was unanimously in 
favor of that resolution. 

I have some knowledge of the opinion of ministers concerning this measure. 
In the Hampshire Association of Congregational ministers there is but one 
man who is not strongly, earnestly and decidedly in favor of this prohibitory 
law, and we all think that he would be a little better if he was. He is not 
the pastor of a church. Among the Methodist ministers I do not know of 
one who is not in favor of the prohibitory law. I never saw a Methodist 
minister who was not right upon this subject. They are all in favor of this 
law. It is just so with the Baptist ministers, and it is just so with the only 
Unitarian minister that we have in the county ; and I do not know a church- 
member in that region who is not in favor of the prohibitory law ; and in 
four towns in the western part of Hampshire County, where I reside, no man 
to-day can purchase a glass of intoxicating liquor. They are enforcing the 
law all over the county. Give us a thorough, efficient State Constabulary, 



APPENDIX. 739 

and we feel that this law can be executed all over the Commonwealth. That 
is the sentiment of the people where I live. We all feel — a great majority I 
know, feel as I do. That is a peculiar county. My friend, the Hon. E. H. 
Sawyer, who was elected to the Senate this year, and to the House last year, 
was elected to the House last year by a unanimous vote. We cannot expect 
such results everywhere, we cannot expect that there will be such a unani- 
mous sentiment in favor of a law all over the Commonwealth, but we feel as 
we did during the war, the same chords are touched now when this question 
comes up that Governor Andrew touched by his proclamations during the 
war. Massachusetts can do what is right, cost what it may. She can enforce 
this law and do her duty here as she did it then. When gentlemen say that 
the law cannot be enforced, we reply that we want to try it. We want to put 
the matter to the test. We all feel just as Senator Stockbridge said to me 
last year when I asked him if there was any danger of the license law being 
passed at the last session. He said, " Massachusetts never takes a back- 
track ;" and we feel that it would be taking a back-track if we had a license 
law. We feel that a permission given to one man to sell, breaks down all the 
force of the law. If right men have that privilege it is right for all men to 
have it. 

There are some facts respecting the enforcement of the law in Connecticut 
that I would like to give, but not to take up the time of this Committee. I 
will only add one thing. In Easthampton, we have the celebrated Williston 
Seminary, where nearly two hundred young men are gathered all the while 
for education. Many gentlemen come to me and ask about the influence 
that will be exerted in that institution upon their children. Again and again 
the question has been asked, " Is there any place in your town where intoxi- 
cating liquors can be purchased ? " And one gentlemen with whom I talked 
who was in favor of the license law said in answer to this question, " Is there 
a gentleman in the United States who has a son to be educated, who would 
not rather put him in the seminary in Easthampton, where the prohibitory 
law was enforced than put him in a town where the license law permitted 
any man in the town under any circumstances to sell liquors V " He answered 
what you may imagine, — " Certainly, any gentleman would prefer to send 
his son where he could not be able to get a drink of liquor under any circum- 
stances." We all feel that we must care for our young men ; that we must 
not permit the sale of liquor in a single place where our young men or any- 
body else can purchase that which will intoxicate. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Did you make the same speech yesterday that you 
just made here ? 

A. No, sir. I never repeat the same speech. This is such a grand subject 
that I can make a thousand different speeches on it the same day. 

Q. I supposed you came as a witness to state the facts ? 

A. That was what I designed to do, and I intend to do it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) At this meeting at Easthampton, not only the 
religious people of this town, but the people generally were present, were they 
not? 

A . Certainly. 



740 APPENDIX. 

Q. Those who did not profess to be religious, and those who feel an inter- 
est in the welfare of the Commonwealth were present and voted unani- 
mously on the resolutions ? 

A. Yes, sir. Not a man stood up against it. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I desire to ask you whether you are entirely confi- 
dent that there will ever be such an enforcement of this prohibitory law as 
will prevent drunkenness and intemperance in the Commonwealth ? 

A. I am. 

Q. You entertain no doubt about that ? 

A. None at all, sir. 

Q. And are you also of the opinion that it will be so enforced as to 
entirely exclude the use of intoxieating liquor as a beverage from all classes ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You have no doubt about that ? 

A. None at all, sir. 

Q. Not the least ? 

A. Not the least, sir. 

Q. How long, in your opinion, will it be before that time will come ? 

A. It will be necessary for a great many of the present generation, who 
are pressing the license law, to pass away, before that point is reached, but I 
believe it will be reached by and by. 

Q. You believe that your opinion upon this subject is entirely right, do 
you? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. And you believe that the opinions of other gentlemen who differ with 
you are entirely wrong ? 

A. I do, sir. I do not say, however, that there are not good men like my 
worthy friend, Mr. Child, who are in favor of a license law. By no means. 
I do not mean to say that every man is a bad man who is in favor of it, but I 
do say that I think that every man who is in favor of it is wrong, just exactly 
as I thought years ago in reference to the Fugitive Slave Law, and the old 
question of slavery. There were ministers, pious, godly men, who believed in 
the Fugitive Slave Law and in slavery. I then felt that they were wrong, 
and I feel so now ; and I feel that they would have been better men if they 
had believed differently on the subject. 

Q. Do you concede an honest difference of opinion to those who differ 
with you in this matter ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. There may be, then,, men who believe that as a matter of legislation, 
some law different from the present law would be better, and still be honest in 
that belief? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. What do you then think, sir, of an effort by yourself, and by men who 
believe as you do, to put your opinion in the form of a criminal law against 
what you concede to be an honest opinion of other persons of the community ? 

A. I think about this matter just as I did about the old slave laws — that 
the fact that men honestly believed that slavery was the best condition for a 



APPENDIX. 741 

certain portion of the race, would not hinder me an instant from passing a law 
that would permit every slave to go free. 

Q. If you felt that one mode of legislation would practically and actually 
promote the cause of temperance, and prevent intemperance better than 
another mode, would you not take that kind of a law ? 
A. That is the kind of law I do take. 

Q. That is begging the question. The question is, would you not prefer 
that kind of legislation which, would most effectually suppress the evils of 
intemperance ? 

A. Certainly I would. That is the great thing to be aimed at; but I 
would have the Commonwealth in, and, by the means which she takes to 
secure that end, act worthy of herself. 

Q. What other way is there for the Commonwealth to act worthy of herself 
than to take the best means of doing the best act ? 

A. That comprehends all. If you take the best means of doing the best 
act, that is all that we ask. 

Q. Now, you and I may differ as to what are the best means, and we may 
honestly differ, may we not ? 
A. Certainly. 

Q. Does it not then result, after all, that this is but a question of opinion 
between men ? Your opinion may be a great deal better than mine, and I 
presume that it is ; but do you not think that you deny an honest difference 
of opinion when you say that all this talk of a license law is " moonshine ? " 

A. I say that all this talk of a license law promoting the cause of temper- 
ance is " moonshine." I did not know that my respected friend, Mr. Child, 
stood upon that platform, or I would have been more careful. 

Q. I ask, after all, if one man honestly believes that one kind of legislation 
will best promote the object aimed at, and another another, is it not between 
them a mere matter of opinion as to what may be the best means to accom- 
plish the same ends ? They differ in opinion as to the means, but is there 
anything more in it than a difference of opinion ? 

A. There may be, sir. I feel in this case that there is a difference of 
opinion between you and me. In my case, in addition to my opinion, is my 
conscience ; but in this case I do not understand you to urge that you are 
acting with any regard to your conscience, any more than you would in any 
other matter of legislation. 

Q. Did you hear what I said in the opening of the case before this Com- 
mittee ? 

A. No, sir ; I only came into the city this morning. 

Q. Do you mean, then, in regard to what we have said and done upon 
this subject, and what has been said and done by the large number of gentle- 
men who have signed this petition, to asperse them all as not acting in accord- 
ance with their Conscience ? 

A. Of course not; I meant no aspersion. 

Q. Do you not mean to say that you act from conscience and they do 
not? 

A. Certainly I do, but not in the sense in which you take it. I feel that 
in sustaining this prohibitory law we are acting from the promptings of our 



742 APPENDIX. 

conscience. It is a part of our religion. Our Christianity has to do with it- 
As Christian men, as good men, we stand up for this law and for its enforce- 
ment. Now, here are certain laws which are before the Legislature, in which 
men who advocate them do not feel impelled to sustain them by their con- 
science or by their religion. It is not saying anything against a man to say 
that he is in favor of such a law, just simply from his intellectual conviction, 
and that his conscience has nothing to do with it, and where there is no great 
principle of right underlying the law ; and that is the attitude in which my 
respected friend, Mr. Child, is placed. I do not think that he is acting con- 
trary to his conscience ; but I think that his conscience has nothing particu- 
larly to do with his action. There is no aspersion or slur in that, I think. 

Q. Do you mean to say that those who are in favor of a license law, the 
large number of Christian ministers standing as well in the community as 
other Christian ministers, who have come herfe and testified in favor of a 
license law — do you mean to say that they are not honest, by every Christian 
principle, in what they have said and done ? 

A. I mean to say that they are not prompted by conscience to advocate 
the license law ; that it does not take hold of them so that they can pray for 
it and work for it as Christian men, from the impulse of their conscience and 
religious nature. 

Q. Is it right for you to say that ? 

A. It is my opinion and I have a right to express it. 

Q. I ask you, as a Christian minister, is it right for you to say that these 
other Christian ministers have acted upon a matter that they could not pray for. 

A. I have not said that they could not. 

Q. Well, upon a matter that they do not pray for. What reason have you 
to say that ? 

A. I will give you a reason. I never heard a man pray for a license law. 
I cannot imagine how he would go to work to do it. Now, I have heard a 
great many prayers for the enforcement of the prohibitory law. I object to 
my statements being twisted so as to intimate any kind of reproach or slur 
upon other Christian ministers. I would not say that those distinguished 
ministers and Christian men who stood up here and testified in favor of a 
license law were acting against their consciences. I do not say any such 
thing, not at all. If what I have said is understood as I meant it, it does not 
cast upon them the slightest slur or reproach. 

Q. But what you say does recommend your own opinion as a conscientious 
one, while theirs is not ? 

A. There is a greater power behind a prohibitory law than there can be 
behind a license law ; that is my opinion. 

Q. You say that you have not meant to cast any reproach upon those who 
have expressed a different opinion ? 

A. Certainly not. 

Q. Do you mean to say a man's Christian principle will not induce him to 
promote temperance by means of a license law ? 

A. You seem desirous to push me a little further than I meant to go. 

Q. Do you mean to say that you do not think the advocates of a license 
law pray for the cause of temperance ? 



APPENDIX. 743 

A. I am rather afraid they do not; that some of them do I have no doubt. 

Q. Is there not on this question an opportunity of a fair difference of 
opinion between conscientious and praying men ? 

A. There may be an honest difference of opinion between those who sus- 
tain, the one the prohibitory and the other the license law. 

Q. I speak of the class of men who have appeared here, both to advocate 
and to testify in favor of a license law ; is there not, in your opinion, between 
them and you, an opportunity for an honest difference of opinion, and may 
they not be as conscientiously engaged in promoting, in their way, the temper- 
ance reform, as you in promoting it in your way ? 

A. I said that I believed that many of them were as honest as I am. 

Q. May they not be impelled by their conscience in lively operation, to 
take the same course they have ? 

A. It is possible. 

Q. You think it is barely possible, and that is all the measure of charity 
that you give to Christian brethren ? 

A. Did I use the word " barely " ? 

Q. Are you willing to answer the question, whether you think that they 
are or are not conscientiously impelled to take the course they do ? 

A. I must say that it is rather a difficult question to answer, and I doubt 
whether I ought to be pressed to give an opinion. There are some whom I 
believe are as conscientious as myself who favor a different policy ; but when 
I see that every man in the community, who wants to open a dram-shop, and 
every vile character, so far as I know, is in favor of a license law, it makes 
me a little suspicious about some of them. 

Q. Do you understand that those gentlemen and Governor Andrew and 
myself are here advocating that which shall open dram-shops ? 

A. Of course ; I suppose that will be the result. 

Q. And to play into the vile hands of the vile characters of the com- 
munity ? 

A. I do not say that that is your intention, but sucli will be the result 
of the license law and the free sale of liquor. 

Q. Dq you understand that anybody here advocates the free sale of 
liquor ? 

A. No, sir ; no man would dare to do it. You could not hope to get a 
license law upon that ground. You must promise to have the law immensely 
stringent. 

Q. Do you mean to say, then, that we are playing a false game here ? 

A. No, sir, not that all of you are, but that some men are, who pay the 
money and hire the counsel that they may sell liquor. That some of them 
are actuated by that motive, I have no doubt. The liquor-dealers want to 
sell liquor without the fear of the jail before them, and would have their busi- 
ness licensed by the government that it may be made more respectable. I 
have heard that statement made again and again. 

Q. You spoke, sir, of opening dram-shops. Do you understand that to be 
the object of the gentlemen who have testified here ? 

A. ■ Oh no, sir; I presume not the majority of them. 



1U APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you understand it to be the object of those upon whose petition this 
investigation is taking place ? 

A. I do not think it is Mr. Hardy's object. 

Q. Do you think it is the object of any of the petitioners ? 

A. I do not know who the other petitioners are. 

Q. Then you should be careful about expressing an opinion about their 
motives. 

A . Of course ; and I have been extremely careful to express my opinion 
just exactly as I had it, and without injury or unfairness toward any man. I 
have not said all I felt toward them, but have restrained myself. 

Q. Is there, at the present time, or would there be in the town of East- 
hampton, if the question was left to the people whether or not the prohibitory 
law should be enforced, or a modification of that law enforced, any doubt as 
to the decision of the people ? 

A. Not at all. 

Q. If, then, a law should be passed, submitting to the people of Hamp- 
shire County, the decision of that question, what, in your opinion, would be 
the decision of the people ? 

A. There would be an overwhelming majority in favor of prohibition. 

Q. Suppose the law permitted the people of each county to decide for 
themselves the question whether or not the sale of liquors should be permitted 
in that county, and the people of Hampshire County decided in favor of pro- 
hibition, would there be any difficulty in enforcing the law there ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think there would be difficulty, if there was a permission 
given for the sale of liquor in Boston. We feel now that in this law we have 
the Commonwealth behind us ; in the other case we should only have Hamp- 
shire County. 

Q. You have the truth upon your side, have you not ? 

A. To be sure. 

Q. Are you not strong enough for that, or do you feel that you want 
Boston to come to your help ? 

A. Of course we want Boston to come to our views ; we want the centre 
right. 

Q. Do you not think that Hampshire County can take care of itself, even 
if Boston does not think as you do ? 

A. I think it is better to have Boston think as we do. 

Q. But suppose that Boston thinks right the other way ? 

A. Then we will use arguments, entreaties and persuasions, and all other 
proper influences to get Boston right. 

Q. Do you think it would be right for the people of Boston, if they enter- 
tained an opinion that it was better to have a modification of the present 
law, to force that modification upon the people of Hampshire County against 
their wish ? 

A. Yes, sir ; politically right, but not morally right. 

Q. Would it be politically right for the people of Hampshire County to 
force upon Boston a system of legislation against her wish ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And against the conscientious opinion of her best citizens ? 



APPENDIX. 745 

A. Certainly. I think it would be just as right for Hampshire as for Bos- 
ton. I said it would be right for Boston to govern Hampshire if she had a 
majority ; so I say it would be right for Hampshire to govern Boston if she 
had the majority. 

Q. Would such action be morally right in respect to a question of police ? 
A. I do not understand just that limit. I am not lawyer enough to under- 
stand it ; but we are all together in the Commonwealth and the majority is to 
rule. I think that principle is right. 

Q. Are you not aware that alcohol is an article of commerce in the com- 
munity and as such is to be bought and sold ? Is not the regulation of that 
sale a question to be determined by each community for its own interest ? 
A. Not for each municipality but for the whole Commonwealth. 
Q. Why do you say the whole Commonwealth and not the whole country ? 
A. I should like it better for the whole country to act upon this matter. 
Your question implies that alcohol is an article of commerce and as such will 
continue to be sold. I do not admit that statement as the truth. 
Q. I mean under the present law ? 

A. No, sir; not under the present law. We are going to suppress the 
traffic. 

Q. Under the present prohibitory law more than half of the liquor manu- 
factured in Massachusetts or brought into it is already sold ? 
A. Certainly, this law has not been enforced. 

Q. It has been sold for beverages and for mechanical and medicinal 
purposes ? 

A. It will always be sold for the arts, of course. 

Q. Taking the fact, that one-half of all the liquor manufactured or brought 
into the Commonwealth has already been sold for the various purposes to 
which it is applied, is it not, when you look at it seriously, a question of wise 
police regulation how this use of this liquor shall be restrained so as to produce 
no bad results, and how the distribution of it shall be restrained ? Here is an 
article of commerce, made so by the constitution and laws of the United 
States, and more generally used in the arts than in any other one thing; now 
how shall this article be distributed so as to produce the least evil ? 

A. If I understand your question rightly, it amounts to this : how can we 
best remove the evils resulting from the liquor traffic ? 
Q. No, sir; my question just now involved that. 
A. That is the way I understood it. 

Q. My question is, how shall the evils resulting from the misuse of an 
article, legally an article of traffic and of commerce, best be restrained ? 

A. That is not a question with me. The only question with me is, how 
the traffic shall best be suppressed — the traffic in intoxicating drink as a 
beverage. I do not like the word " restrained" in your question, if you will 
permit me to dissent. 

Q. Do you suppose that you are going in Massachusetts to suppress the 
use of the ten million of gallons of liquor annually used in the arts ? 
A. No, sir; but I would suppress all used as a beverage. 
Q. Will you not also lake the best means to restrain and prevent the mis- 
use of that which is intended for use in the arts ? 
94 



746 APPENDIX. 

A. Certainly I would. 

Q. If you found out that entire prohibition would not restrain the abuse, 
would you not then try something else ? 

A. I cannot conceive of the possibility which is suggested in the question. 

Q. What do you understand by the enforcement of the prohibitory law ? 

A. That it will not be sold openly, nor in any other manner, except as the 
law regulates. 

Q. If it is sold as the law permits, and the liquor is then misused, is it any 
the less injurious than if sold in any other way ? 

A. Of course not. 

Q. A large quantity of this liquid goes into the mechanics' shops ; suppose 
the men get hold of it and use it as a beverage — they may use it in that way, 
may they not ? 

A. Of course. 

Q. Now, sir, as the sale must be permitted, may there not be an honest dif- 
ference of opinion in regard to the manner in which it shall be restrained ? 

A. I have no doubt that there may be an honest difference of opinion 
there. 

Q. If the prohibitory law were really enforced, what do you think would 
be the effect of annually distributing ten million gallons of liquor through the 
town agencies ? Suppose the town agencies undertake to distribute this ten 
million gallons for use in the arts would it not necessarily make every town 
agency a grog-shop upon a grand scale ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. 

Q. Would it not necessarily raise up a great interest, a great political 
power connected with this sale, that nobody could overthrow ? Do you believe 
that the putting of this ten million gallons of liquor, equivalent to twenty-five 
million of dollars, into the hands of the town agents for distribution for 
mechanical and medicinal purposes, could be effected without producing 
incalculable mischief? 

A. Why not? It is always a troublesome thing to manage liquor. It is 
hard to find a man to whom it can be committed for distribution, who will 
remain honest under the temptation, and this is one of the reasons why I am 
so opposed to licensing anybody to sell it. 

Q. AVould not such an amount of business necessarily tend to corrupt the 
agencies, and so act that Avhat had begun with temperance would end in grog 
politics and a grog party ? 

A. No, I do not think so. 

Q. You say that you think not ; is not that a question upon which the 
friends of temperance may honestly differ, — whether they will embark the 
Commonwealth in the interest of selling liquor to the amount of twenty-five 
million of dollars per year, or keep the Commonwealth pure from the traffic 
and bring all moral efforts to bear upon the cause of temperance ? Is not 
that a moral question upon which our temperance men may honestly differ ? 

A. They may differ of course, but I do not see how there can be any 
greater danger than at present. 

Q. Have you ever thought of this question before ? 

A. No, sir, not seriously. 



APPENDIX. 74T 

Q. Has it ever occurred to you before ? 

A. Not that there was any danger that could result from the execution of 
the law greater than the danger at present existing. 

Q. Then you must admit, that men of thought and reflection may have 
seen danger in that direction and therefore honestly differ with you as to the 
expediency of such legislation ? 

A. To be sure they may. 

Q. And may not thinking and reflecting men, honestly feel and fear that 
under such a system the Commonwealth may be swept into a sea of grog 
politics ? 

A. Perhaps so, but I have not the slightest apprehension of such result. 

Q. You may not have. 

A. Nor do I see how anybody else can have. I am not afraid that a 
thorough enforcement of the prohibitory law will swamp the State in intem- 
perance. 

Q. Do you think that liquor ought to be sold as a medicine ? 

A . I have my doubts about it. 

Q. Do you think it would be wrong, if a man had a broken limb to apply 
a bandage wet with spirits and water ? 

A. I do not know that there would be any wrong in that. 

Q. Are you not aware of the fact that for the last ten years the spirits for 
wetting the bandage in such a case as I have supposed could not be bought 
or sold in Boston without a violation of the law ? 

A. I have seen that statement in the papers. 

Q. Do you think that statement correct ? 

A. I presume the facts as stated, that it could not be bought of any 
licensed dealer is correct. But I think that matter could be easily arranged 

Q. But that has been, and is, the state of things existing under the pro- 
hibitory law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) The attempt has been made to commit you to the 
idea that by the enforcement of this law, we should be swamped in a sea of 
grog politics. Have we not been swamped in that sea before ? 

A. We have been in danger of it, it seems to me. 

Adjourned. 



748 APPENDIX, 



TWENTY-FIRST DAY. 

Wednesday, March 27, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony on 
behalf of the Remonstrants was resumed. 

Testimony of Albert Day, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are a graduate of Harvard Medical College, 
and are Superintendent of the Washingtonian Home ? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q. How many years have you occupied your present position ? 

A. Almost ten years — nine and one-half years, I think. 

Q. I have heard a rumor that you are about to leave that situation. Have 
you been called to another similar one ? 

^4. I have; but I was not aware that it had become so public as to be 
spoken of here. I have been called to a larger institution. 

Q. A similar institution ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you state briefly the effect of alcoholic beverages upon the human 
economy, particularly from your own point of view ? 

Q. Well, sir, I presume the question is asked upon physiological grounds, 
as to the effects of an excess upon a healthy economy, is it not ? 

Q. Yes, sir. 

A. Well, sir, it is very pernicious in every respect. It destroys the tone 
of the stomach ; it destroys the power of digestion, and prevents the assimila- 
tion of food ; it destroys the tone of the nervous system, and develops the 
lower emotions ; it suppresses the higher, and it makes anything but a man 
and a good man ; it develops different forms of mania, and converts a good 
man into a bad man. There are many details which might be related which 
do not occur to me at this moment. 

Q. What is your observation in regard to those whom you came in contact 
with in your duties, in regard to the temptation to drink moderately ? 

A. Well, sir, they almost always — and I do not know but I may say 
always — commence as moderate drinkers ; commencing usually in the moderate 
use, and the habit gradually growing upon them until they find themselves 
drunkards, although they generally are the last ones to find it out. All his 
friends find it out, and the community in which he lives find it out ; but he is 
the last man to find that such is the fact. It is very subtle in its operations 
upon the human system. A person will commence very moderately, and the 
habit will gradually assume this power over him until it chains and binds him, 
and he finds himself the victim of a power that he cannot resist. 

Q. When awakened from the degradation to which they have come, do 
they find themselves able to leave it and be governed by their better judg- 
ment ? 



APPENDIX. 749 

A. They do not; their judgment is destroyed. 

Q. What is your judgment as to the integrity of men who have fallen into 
this habit ? 

A. Persons who habitually use intoxicants, as I have often remarked, 
become affected as to moral principle, and it will often make them to lie and 
deceive, and falsify every way. 

Q. Untruthfulness is characteristic of them, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And therefore this is an illustration of your position, that it develops 
the lower instincts ? 

A. Yes, sir ; it always develops the lower instincts in our nature and 
suppresses the higher. 

Q. Are these results likely to become chronic ? 

A. Yes, sir ; the tendency of the moderate use of alcohol is such. 

Q. Do you find the universal appetite for strong drinks to be a steady and 
increasing appetite ? 

A. Yes, sir ; there is always a tendency to increase the appetite, although 
there are exceptions to the rule. There is now and then a man in the com- 
munity who can take a glass of liquor occasionally, and the habit does not 
grow upon him. 

Q, Are you aware how generally it is known among physicians ? 

A. It is common for physicians to disagree ; and I believe the most intelli- 
gent and the most distinguished in our country are not in favor, but deprecate 
the use of alcohol as a medicine in that direction. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you propose that the Legislature should pass 
any law to prevent these physicians from using liquor in medicine ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not propose that the Legislature should pass any law to 
prevent physicians from using it. 

Q. Then you do not think that it is desirable for the Legislature to 
undertake to interfere for the purpose of controlling the subject of medication 
in this way ? 

A . I think there should be curbs thrown around all. 

Q. That is not answering my question. 

A. Well, of course, liquor should be where it can be obtained for medical 
purposes, because sometimes it is necessary, no doubt. 

Q. Is it not true that a majority of the medical profession, and the leading 
men of the medical profession, do very largely give alcoholic stimulants to 
their patients in acute disease, and also in feebleness resulting from age or 
other deteriorating causes ? 

A. No, sir. I may say that I believe that it is not usually given, and it is 
well known to the medical faculty that the use of alcohol is a Boston notion, 
and that, outside of Boston, it is not used to any great extent. 

Q. You mean to say that in Connecticut they do not largely give brandy 
and whiskey to people laboring under typhoid fever, just as commonly as they 
give beef tea ? 

A. No, sir. I mean to say that they do not. 

Q. ■ Have you ever practised medicine ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



750 APPENDIX. 

Q, Outside the Washingtonian Home ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You took your degree sometime ago ? 

A. No, sir ; last summer. 

Q. Your practice is here in Boston and not in Connecticut ? 

A. I mean to say that, from my conversation with others, I learned the 
fact. 

Q. Are you not aware that physicians do, as a matter of personal practice, 
resort to such beverages for their own support, under excessive labor and 
fatigue, and when the system becomes lowered by temporary disease or fatigue ? 

A . I am not aware that such is the fact, although it may be. 

Q. Have you read Dr. Brinton's work on food and digestion ? 

A. I have read his work on the stomach. 

Q. And have you read his work on food and digestion ? 

A. I have not, sir. 

Q. Then you are not aware of the facts that he expresses touching an 
attempt at universal total abstinence, as regards its effect upon the health of 
the people ? 

A. I have read extracts from Dr. Brinton's work on the stomach, and I 
know what his opinions were in regard to the action of alcohol upon the 
human economy. 

Q. The question I am calling your mind to, is the careful and temperate 
use of those beverages, under fitting circumstances, proportionate to the cir- 
cumstances and conditions of the individual person. 

A. There is no doubt of it, sir, if the temperate use is always observed. 

Q. Would you make war against the ocean, because some people get 
drowned in it ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would you make war against the use of alcoholic beverages in gen- 
eral ? Do you make universal and indiscriminate war against all alcoholic 
drinks ? 

A. I do ; because it is a universal and indiscriminate evil. 

Q. Then you do make universal and indiscrimate war against these bever- 
ages, because of their abuse ? 

A. Yes, sir ; because of their natural tendency ; and because the natural 
and inevitable tendency is to excess. 

Q. The tendency is in the man and not in the thing, is it not ? 

A. If they do not use it, it will not hurt them. 

Q. I understand you to admit that there is a proper use sometimes ? 

A. I have; but I think that where one person is saved by its use as a 
medicine, there are a thousand who die. 

Q. Have you examined the statistics that have been accumulated on this 
subject, so as to know that what you have now stated, is any more than theo- 
retically true ? 

A. I have read everything I could find upon the suject. 

Q. My question is whether you have brought your mind into connection 
with the statistics accumulated thus far in this country in reference to the 
subject. 



APPENDIX. 751 

A. I think I have some. 

Q. Are you aware what they teach except upon the general theory ? 

A. Yes, sir; I believe that as far as investigations have been made, it is 
freely conceded by scientific men, and by philanthropists, that alcohol is the 
great curse of our race, destroying human life and vitality, and doing vastly 
more injury than it would if it were not used. 

Q. Are you aware that the statistics, so far as known, show no such 
thing, and if so, where is the man that has said it ? 

A. I have not the authority by me. 

Q. Supposing they are to be had, you can easily obtain them? 

A. I have the authority of the best writers upon the subject. 

Q. I am asking their opinions, and the deductions which they are able to show ? 

A . I have the statements of men who have collected the facts on this subject, 
both in Europe and America, and I have recently examined the statistics in 
regard to the proj:>ortion of deaths from this cause. 

Q. Where? 

A. In the city of New York. 

Q. What do they prove ? 

A . They prove that just in proportion as bar-rooms exist in some of the 
wards of New York, just in that proportion the mortality increases. 

Q. Do you think that in any sort of personal fairness between man and 
man, that is an answer to my question ? I was not asking you in regard to the 
amount of drinking at the Five Points bar-rooms in New York. I asked you 
to give me the results of careful and scientific investigation by careful and 
scientific men into the use of spirituous liquors, or the distilled and fermented 
liquors in all human society, not taking out the most objectionable cases ? 

A. The reason why I answered your question as I did, is because, as I 
said before, it is. the universal opinion of scientific men. 

Q. Give us one man ? 

A. Dr. Lees, of Manchester, England. 

Q. Have you. read Dr. Lees' book ? Has he accumulated any scientific 
evidence to prove that ? 

A. I think he has, sir. 

Q. Then I pray you read that book again. 

A. I think his views are most conclusive in relation to the use of alcohol. 

Q. Have you examined the statistics in other countries ? I will take 
Scotland, for instance, which has the reputation of more drunkenness than 
any other in the world. Have you examined the statistics of the registrar- 
general of Scotland ? 

A. I have not. I know this fact as stated by yourself: that a large 
amount of whiskey is manufactured in Scotland. I think some Scotch writers 
have rather denied the fact that Scotland was the most drunken country. A 
large amount is exported from Scotland. 

Q. Did you ever hear it testified that every tenth house in Glasgow was a 
place where liquor was sold ? 

A . That is a statement that is made frequently. But all these statements 
are more or less calculations. 



752 APPENDIX. 

Q. I am asking you the statement of the sheriff of the county. Are you 
aware— for I think you know something about drunkenness — that for a long 
period it was the universal testimony of travellers and writers in respect to 
Scotland, that whereas it was an extraordinarily ascetic country in respect to 
its theology, it was the loosest country in the Protestant world, certainly, in 
respect to its morality in that direction, and also in the direction of sensuality ? 

A. I have heard that statement made. 

Q. Now do you know what has been the result to winch the recent 
investigation of the registrar-general has conducted his mind ? 

A . I am not aware of it. 

Q. Now are you aware of the result to which the investigations of Dr. 
Brinton, in from fifty to seventy thousand cases, conducted his mind ? 

A . I am not aware of the result of his investigation in that matter. 

Q. Do you know what the number of deaths caused by delirium tremens is, 
in this country, annually ? 

A. I am not aware ; if I have noticed the statements, I do not remember 
them now. 

Q. Do you know the number of deaths ascribed by the returns — I am not 
talking about guesses, but actual cases ascribed by the government returns to 
intemperance as a specific cause of mortality ? 

A. I should not rely upon the returns. 

Q. I am getting at the statistics. 

A . I do not know anything about it. 

Q. It is very easy to assume a position theoretically. 

A. What I mean to say is that the statistics of returns are very defective 
oftentimes. I have had persons die of delirium tremens, whom I have been 
treating ; but I never have returned a case from that cause. They die from 
various causes. They die of congestion of the brain. But delirium tremens 
was the primary cause. Consequently, I say, that it is our duty to save the 
feelings of the friends as much as possible ; and we put down something else 
when we make the returns. 

Q. Do you know how many people die from the accidental discharge of 
fire-arms, compared with the number of those who die from delirium tremens, 
and from intemperance as a general cause ? 

A. I have no doubt that the statistics of the deaths from the accidental 
discharge of fire-arms may be credited ; but in regard to delirium tremens, I 
should not rely upon the statistics at all. 

Q. Are you acquainted with statistics given in regard to the number of 
accidental deaths in this country ? 

A. There are statements made of the number of persons who die from 
intemperance ; but I think that the facts are not known positively. 

Q. Have you ever known a practising physician yourself, who made it a 
matter of inquiry, for many years, to observe in his own practice, and in the 
community, the effect produced by indiscriminate total abstinence upon 
patients, and the effect produced by moderate drinking, and the effects pro- 
duced by drunkenness, with a view of extracting a final conclusion from the 
broadest basis of facts ? 



APPENDIX. 753 

A. There may be such statistics prepared, but I am not aware of them. 

Q. Then your opinions have not been based upon any such investigations ? 

A. They have been based upon such observation and inquiry, and such 
statistics as have come within ray means of observation. 

Q. And it comes to this, that if a man has got in the habit of drinking 
intoxicating liquors, it is a dangerous habit for him V 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And if a man drinks too much it will hurt him ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the world is full of dangers and evils ? 

A. There is no other evil so baleful as the evil ascribed to alcohol. 

Q. Do you mean to say that ? 

A. I do mean to say it. 

Q. Do you mean that there is no other evil among human evils, which is 
the occasion of more mortality than the evil of excessive drinking ? 

A. Yes, sir; I mean that it is greater than all other causes combined. 

Q. But you have not compared it with, sexuality ? 

A. It is merely opinion. 

Q. The misery from sensuality and licentiousness is .very great ? 

A. But from my observation it is very much less than from the use of 
alcohol. 

Q. That is a priori reasoning, and observation from your sphere, and that 
almost totally confined to the care and cure of drunken mania. 

A. The observation of nearly a lifetime, sir. 

Q. Do you not recognize it as oftentimes to be a specific and independent 
disease ? 

A. No, sir, I do not think it is. 

Q. Do you mean to say that you differ from the medical world on that 
question ? 

A. No, sir ; I mean to say this : that there are certain organizations that 
have a greater affinity for alcohol, or that alcohol has a worse effect upon some 
men than others, and such men it subdues and destroys quicker ; and these 
men are generally men of most sensitive organization. For instance, I might 
mention distinguished persons who have become intemperate. We oftentimes 
hear it said that they are persons of greater intellect. I do not recognize 
that as being true, but it is a peculiarly fine organization. These persons are 
more likely to become intemperate than persons who are more phelgmatic in 
their organization. 

Q. But is it not also true that such persons are more easily made the vic- 
tims of any and every other form of insanity ? 

A. It may be. 

Q. In fact, after all, is not insanity itself a disease of civilization ? 

A. Insanity itself is a disease of civilization. 

Q. Now I am talking about a question that I just put you relating to 
drunkenness, as you find it developed in many individual cases which have 
come under your observation, and which seem to be entirely independent of 
any constant or daily use of liquors, or even occasional use as a matter of 
luxury. 

95 



754 APPENDIX. 

A. There are certain persons born of low organizations, — for instance, 
born of intemperate parents ; such persons are more apt to become drunkards 
than others. And these persons are more apt to have paroxysms of drunk- 
enness. And you will find them usually low in other respects ; and you will 
find them irreligious and immoral. We recognize that fact ; and it may be 
that in such persons, born of intemperate parents, or having a syphilitic taint, 
there is a tendency which might produce the same thing. 

Q. Have you not known of cases of men of habitual abstinence for weeks 
and months together, and who, just as certain as a given period arrived, would 
give themselves up to an uncontrollable fit of insane drinking, and drink 
until they could drink no longer, and then lie down to be carried off ; and 
then resume their habit of abstinence again ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And do you know that in that class of persons they are led by some- 
thing entirely aside from their volition? Have you not observed in their 
sleep and dreams, when the time approaches, a nervous and physical distrac- 
tion and excitement which you observe in some other forms of insanity ? 

A. I have observed just that class of patients ; and I have observed, too, 
that when they are put under medical treatment, after a few months these, 
paroxysms coming on and going off, they gradually loose their power, and 
they are entirely restored. 

Q. And many of them are capable of being cured, if they are subjected to 
medical treatment ? 

A. Yes, sir, and total abstinence. 

Q. These are cases of drunken disease in the system ? 

A. Not a drunken disease, per se, but a disease induced by the use of 
alcohol. 

Q. Or developed ? 

A. I do not know whether it is developed or induced ; it is there. 

Q. You would not undertake to judge mankind by these exceptional cases, 
would you ? 

A. These persons just mentioned ? I would not attempt to judge a class 
of drunkards by these. 

Q. Nor all mankind by the drunkards ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You recognize the fact, do you not, that one of the most universal ele- 
ments, next to air and water, found in nature, is alcohol ? 

A. No, sir, I do not recognize that fact. I believe it is not right. 

Q. Are you aware of any corner of the earth where alcohol in some form 
or other is not to be seen or found, used or abused ? 

A. Well, I do not know how that is. One thing is sure, that alcohol is 
comparatively a modern discovery ; I do not know exactly the time. 

Q. Do you consider the days of Noah as modern ? 

A. I believe they did not distil liquor then. Of course there is a certain 
process of fermentation which produces intoxication. 

Q. Is not wine an ordinance of nature ? Is it not, by an ordinance of 
nature, almost as universal as nature itself, that alcohol, as the result of fer- 
mentation, if not of distillation, can be found everywhere ? 



APPENDIX. 755 

A. It is found in all liquor, and in all substances fermented. 
Q. Do you suppose it is possible, by any action of human government, 
to exclude it ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not suppose it is possible, by any action of human gov- 
ernment, to exclude a natural product. 

Q. Or exclude it from the ordinary and common use ? 
A. Well, I do not suppose that it is, if men will use it. 
Q. Exactly ; and do you not suppose that, where there is a tea-kettle and 
two quarts of molasses, they can make it as well as they can a cup of tea ? 
A. The process is very simple. 

Q. Suppose you take the most uncivilized people. Do you not know that, 
in the interior of Africa, Dr. Livingston tells us that the people take the palm 
tree, and draw the sweet juice from it, and before night get a drink of 
fermented palm toddy ? 

A. It may be true. Our herbs and greens in the spring of the year con- 
tain many poisons, if we were to extract them. Nevertheless, they are food 
and not poison, when we eat them. 

Q Therefore the proper course for man to pursue is to avoid the abuse of 
these productions or results of nature, and to use them according to their 
natural design and use ? 

A. The better way is to abstain from that which can or possibly may 
injure, and eat or drink that from which he can derive advantage. 

A. I suppose that you never felt any but a good effect from eating three 
slices of mutton chop ? 

A. I do not know that I have, except, perhaps, from indigestion. 
Q. Suppose you had eaten thirteen ? 
A. But excess in eating and drinking are different. 
Q. Do you mean to say that there is nothing like gluttony in the world ? 
A. Certainly there is. 

Q. Do you think the Committee is to believe that there is no use of these 
stimulants which is harmless ? 

A. Natural food and unnatural stimulants are two different things. 
Q. But who taught you that the fermented juice of the grape was an 
unnatural stimulant ? 
A. Then it is something else ; it is not the juice of the grape. 
Q. Supposing that you think that it is not only useless but unwise and 
harmful for people to drink it, do you not recognize the fact of the universal 
presence all over the earth, savage, barbarous, civilized, and refined alike, of 
these results of fermentation, if not of distillation ? 

A. I recognize the effect of a natural law, but not a fermentation. It did 
not ferment in the grape. Nature has provided an air-tight bottle in the skin 
of the grape. 

Q. But nature provides for breaking the bottle ? 
A. Not always. 

Q. Is it not, after all, when you observe the presence, within anybody's 
reach, everywhere on the earth, of this dangerous and seductive form of a 
product or result of nature — is it not at best the merest quackery ,to endeavor 
through human legislation, to put it out of the way ? Is there practically 



756 APPENDIX. 

the least chance of its being successful in the long run ? Or is there anything 
on the earth that gives the least promise of success ? 

A. It is impossible for me to answer that. It is impossible to tell what 
there may be. Of course there is a reasonable and natural course, which 
legislation may pursue, in protecting society from the evil influences which 
destroy. I am not exactly able to define how legislation should be in this 
matter ; but of course it should be to protect the rights of the people. We 
consider ourselves free, every man to eat and drink what he pleases ; yet 
society may see fit to say that a man shall not do a certain thing, if not doing 
it is for the good of the whole. That seems to be the natural way. How far 
this may go I will not undertake to say. 

Q. You will not undertake to describe that ? 

A. No, sir. 

■ Testimony of Rev. Mark Hopkins, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) The Committee would like to hear from you such 
observations as your observation will allow you to give, in a practical point of 
view, as to the policy the State should adopt as regards continuing the present 
prohibitory law or adopting a license law ? 

A. I have paid no special attention to the collection of facts on this sub- 
ject. It is now six or seven years since the law was passed, and when it was 
passed the temperance people in Williamstown had a meeting and appointed 
an agent to prosecute under the law, or to see that the law was enforced, and 
Professor Bascomb was appointed, and since that time the law has been prac- 
tically enforced there, and the effect of it has been decidedly good. I asked 
him to state to me, or to put on paper, the general effects that came under his 
observation in connection with that fact, and he did so. He has been agent 
for six or seven years ; and I would say, in order to indicate the sort of mate- 
rial that we had to deal with in the matter, that when he was appointed a 
number of us came into an agreement to indemnify him for any injury that 
he might receive from incendiary fires in consequence of the action which he 
might take. This was before the appointment of the State constables ; since 
that time he has not acted. He has complained of some eighteen places for 
selling and quite a number of cases of drunkenness, and in most all cases the 
suits were successful. In that period the traffic was without difficulty driven 
into obscurity, wholly arrested and confined to the Irish. The benefit of the 
law has been very great and manifest. At the commencement of the prosecu- 
tions, both hotels and the restaurant were engaged in the sale, and the suit 
brought them to terms and stopped the traffic. The traffic has been held in 
check solely by the law. There has been no sale during this time to offer 
any temptation to the young or to the temperate, I deem the law to have 
been of incalculable benefit to us thus far for the past nine years and now to 
be well enforced. I believe and I know that we are far more temperate than 
the adjoining towns in New York who are under a license system. These are 
the facts, as stated by him. My opinion, as based on my observation, is that 
the law has worked exceedingly well with us. We think it would be a great 
calamity to have a bar opened in that place. I do not know how far I am 
desired to go^ in expressing opinions on the general subject. I have no wish 



APPENDIX. 757 

to volunteer opinions here, though I am willing to state my opinions fully. 
These are facts which I have stated. 

Q. Any leading considerations in your mind bearing upon this subject 
would be profitable to the Committee ? 

A. My observation of the object of the law, is that, except incidentally, it 
has nothing more to do with the preservation of morals than the law against 
stealing has. It stands, in that respect, precisely upon the same basis ; but it 
is a question of the rights of man, and I do not know why a business should 
be authorized which takes money, in order to pay for the vices or poverty 
which it causes, out of my pocket, any more than why a law should authorize 
and enable a man to come and put his hand into my pocket and take out money. 
I suppose a law is based on the rights of men, and in the same way may 
benefit a person, the same as a law against stealing may. I suppose it is for 
the Legislature to decide whether it will or not. If it will, I suppose it is 
enacted on the ground of protecting the rights of men and their property. 

Q. And incidentally promote their welfare ? 

A. That is a question as to the proper provisions of legislation ; but I con- 
sider the basis of legislation is the protection of men in their rights, and that 
the community have rights in this matter, and have a right to be protected 
from the payment of taxes for the vices and poverty produced by any busi- 
ness whatever. 

Q. What is your view with regard to such a law affording incidental pro" 
tection to the welfare and well-being of the community ? 

A . I think the community have the same right to prevent temptation to 
the young, which cannot be rebutted by argument, from the exposure of intox- 
icating drinks, as they have to prevent the exposure to indecent pictures ; 
and I think that incidentally the effect is important on the welfare of the 
community. 

Q. Does the problem labor in your mind in regard to trenching on the 
rights of the community under this law ; that is, do you feel that the principle 
of the law, broadly considered, is open to the objection of trenching upon the 
rights of the community, or how, on the whole, does it lie in your mind ? 

A. I suppose that the principle of the law is for the protection of the 
rights of the community. 

Q. If there is any consideration that you desire to add, we would be happy 
to hear. 

A. I do not know that I have anything. I have no faith whatever in any 
efficacy of the license law as restraining the sale. I would express that opin- 
ion, and I would say that in all respects, so far as I have opportunity to 
observe the general result in public gatherings with us, as in town meetings, 
everything of that kind has been highly favorable. The aspect of such meet- 
ing has been changed since this law has been in operation, and the opinion of 
very many who have had opinions upon the effects of the law, I know has 
been changed in favor of the law in connection with its workings as seen with 
us. 

Q. The proposition presented in mere outline is to give discretionary 
powers on the subject to the various municipalities in the Commonwealth. Do 
you perceive anything objectionable in that feature ? 



758 APPENDIX. 

A. I do not think I am sufficiently acquainted with the relations of the 
different parties to express an opinion. 

Q. The question I intended to raise more particularly, was whether you 
would deem that the several towns and cities would stand as fair a chance to 
protect themselves against the evils of the traffic when the power was lodged 
in the several municipalities, as they would to have it lodged in the Common- 
wealth itself? 

A. My opinion would be worth very little on that subject, but my impres- 
sion is that I should not. 

Q. Licenses being granted in one town, how would it affect another 
town where it was not licensed ? 

A. It would injure, undoubtedly. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You do not ascribe an evil which society suffers, 
to the mere presence of alcoholic liquors ? The remedy you propose would 
not be to banish alcoholic liquids, would it ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Therefore we have to assume the constant presence in the community 
of a large quantity of alcoholic liquids, pretty well distributed ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you any idea of the quantity of liquids now used according to the 
provision of existing law, necessarily used by manufacturers and in the 
arts, and that are thus distributed throughout all the municipalities, and in all 
the workshops of Massachusetts ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. You do not know how that is ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then you have not taken that into consideration ? 

A. Yes, sir, I have. 

Q. Then do you or do you not propose to banish these entirely ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then the evil of the presence of these things in society, and their large 
and general distribution, is an evil not to be got rid of? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What do you mean then ? Are these things to remain, and be dis- 
tributed in the workshops and manufactories throughout the community ? 

A. I mean that they are to remain and be distributed. 

Q. Then it is widely distributed ; that is plain. 

A. Yes, sir; it is a distribution in so much that it is a temptation and 
can be got at ; but I think it is not made respectable to drink it, and that 
it is not made a temptation to be put into the hands of these people who have 
these proclivities to drink it. 

Q. We will assume that it is respectable ; but when we consider that it 
enters into the walls of this room, and that it is used to clean your coat, and 
that it was used in making your hat, and that it was used in the manufacture 
of your Bible and spelling-book, and that it is so widely distributed through- 
out the community that there is scarcely any craftsman who does not handle 
it, you would not think that it would be so banished as not to be within the 
reach of a very large class of the community ? 



APPENDIX. 759 

A. I should not assume to banish it from this table, or from the walls of 
this room. 

Q. But it was in the man's hands before ? 

A. I should not expect to banish it from any of the products of nature. 

Q. Then the thing which you want to accomplish is to prevent its being 
offered for sale at saloons, bars, or tippling-shops, and under such circum- 
stances as to operate as a specific seduction upon society? Is that the 
ground upon which you wish to stand ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And you would go for any law that would be successful in meeting the 
tide of intemperance, and which would be practically the best law for the 
cause of temperance ? 

A. That is the result which I wish to reach. I should wish to reach that, 
but I should not wish to have an immorality licensed. 

Q. But the immorality is not in the existence of the article nor in the 
proper sale of the article, but the immorality consists in the abuse of it and in 
the wrongful and seductive sale of it ; is not that so ? 

A. I do not think it can be licensed, according to any impression that I 
have of the license system as it existed, without having these evils follow. 

Q. Then that is the opinion that follows from a preconception of a certain 
kind of license law, and not from a possible kind of license law ? 

A. I suppose that there must be a license on the part of any law. There 
has been under this law. There has always been a person licensed in the 
towns to sell, and I suppose that is to continue. 

Q. Do you recollect that under this very law licenses are granted for 
persons to distil New England rum to be sold without reserve to go out of 
the State, the sale to be in quantities of not less than thirty gallons at a 
time? 

A. I have not examined the law carefully. 

Q. Then, so far as a moral testimony of the law is concerned, regarding 
it as an abstract moral testimony, you observe that the law of Massachusetts, 
as it is now written on the books, is a law which authorizes the distillation of 
Medford rum, to be sent to all parts of the world, the heathen inclusive ? 

A. I am sorry for it. 

Q. This is the very law which your law proposes to sustain ? 

A. I do not propose to sustain it by any law at all. 

Q. I am glad to know how you stand upon this point. It will have a 
great weight with the people of Massachusetts. 

A. I hope that I shall be fairly dealt with here, sir, and that if I have 
said anything inadvertently that a sense will not be given to it that I 
did not intend. 

Q. If there is anything doubtful I will endeavor to make it perfectly clear. 

A. I do not understand what opinion you understand me to entertain. 

Q. In what respect ? 

A. In respect to the present law. 

Q. I understand that you came here to testify for the purpose of lending 
the weight of your opinion and great character, and influence, and intelligence 
in support of the existing legislation as written upon the statute book. 



760 APPENDIX. 

A. I did not come here with any such purpose. I came here to answer 
questions which may be put to me. 

Q. Now you were kind enough to give us some of the facts which you had 
secured from Professor Bascomb. Are you aware that we had your Treasurer, 
the Hon. Joseph White, a few days ago, to testify. ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then you are not aware that your adjoining towns in New York were 
more reliable than Williamstown ? 

A. I have not known of the testimony. 

Q. When I examined him as to the opportunities of getting liquor in 
Williamstown, he admitted that nearly every year since the law was passed, 
in the town of Adams, it was easy to get liquor in many places, and that you 
could get it by sending down to Pittsfield, and that it was easy to send to 
Vermont or to Springfield ; and I asked him if it could be got in the neigh- 
boring towns across the line, in New York, and he said that you would have 
to send to Troy, because, as he said, our neighbors in New York are more 
reliable than they are with us. 

A. I have not known of the testimony. \ 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) When you say that you did not come here to 
uphold any particular law, do you mean to say that you have no preference 
between the prohibitory or the license law ? 

A. I have a decided preference for prohibition, sir. 

Q. The Governor tells you that the present law authorizes the selling of 
liquors to be carried beyond the State, and to be used out of the State, for 
common purposes. Is it not manifest that the law intends to give merely to 
manufacturers the ordinary benefits of legitimate commerce ; and as these 
are lawful purposes in the State, so these are lawful purposes beyond the 
State. Would you not think it expedient, under these circumstances, to 
allow this manufacture for purposes beyond the limits of the State, leaving 
those States to regulate it for themselves ? 

A. That is one of those broad subjects which I have not investigated, and 
I do not suppose my opinion would be of any particular value. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) I think you stated that it would be a, great 
calamity to have persons licensed in your town ? 

A. I should, sir, think it a great calamity. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Do you think that your town would probably vote 
to license persons to sell liquor, under the plan proposed by this system ? 

A. I do not know anything about that. I do not think that the native 
population would. 

Q. Should you think that it was the sense of the majority of the public 
that they would or would not ? 

A. I do not know, sir ; there is a very considerable number of voters who 
are Irish and formerly interested in the sale. That proportion would go for 
the sale. What the proportion is exactly, I do not know. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Since the existing statutes of Massachusetts 
authorize the licensing of distilleries for the production of New England 
rum and other liquors to be sold to anybody who wants them for use in manu- 
factures or in the arts, and the like, in quantities not less than thirty gallons, 



APPENDIX. 761 

do you think it is desirable for the legislation of Massachusetts to be so 
framed as to encourage and increase distillation in the State, and turn away- 
capital and our industry in the direction of distillation ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Now assuming that we have to use five or ten millions of gallons 
annually in the manufactures and in the arts, which must be procured from 
somewhere, do you not think it better that the manufacturers and artisans of 
Massachusetts should be left free to buy the best articles in the cheapest 
markets, rather than that they should be confined to the purchase of them 
from certain pet State distilleries or certain authorized distillers in the 
State, or from State agencies as a matter of profit to the State ? 

A. I have no particular interest in that question, and I have no particular 
means of answering it. 

Q. Then you do not see any objection to allowing the ordinary rales of 
political economy and the rightful purchase, and use, and employment of 
these things in the arts and manufactures ? 

A . Certainly, so far as these things are employed in the arts, I see no rea- 
son why they should not be used in the same way as other things are provided. 

Q. But you would not undertake to make legislation, the tendency of 
which would be to turn off manufacture into places where it does not natu- 
rally go ? 



Testimony of Henry L. Sabin, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How many years have you resided in Williams- 
town ? 

A. Thirty-nine years. 

Q. You are a practising physician ? 

A. _Yes, sir. 

Q. Will you state, in a few words, your opinions in reference to the ques- 
tion of license or prohibition, involving any remarks you may be disposed to 
make as to the influence of alcoholic beverages upon the individual health 
and individual wealth of the community ? 

A . I am in favor of prohibition, for the reason that I have always found 
the use of alcoholic drinks prejudicial to the health of the community, and 
productive of disease, poverty, and trouble. 

Q. You have heard the testimony that has been given touching your own 
town. Have you any modification to make in regard to the operation of the 
law? 

A. Yes, sir. When I commenced business in the town of Williamstown, 
thirty-nine years ago, it was found that there was sold at our stores about 
eleven thousand dollars' worth of rum every year. The subject has been agi- 
tated in our town from that time to the present. We have taken the vote a 
great many times upon the subject of licensing in our town. We always 
carry it by an overwhelming majority. 

Q. Against license ? 

A. Against licenses of all kinds. I think some twenty years ago, when the 
subject was agitated a great deal in our own town at our county temperance 
96 



762 APPENDIX. 

meeting, it was agitated in regard to selling in the county. Our temperance 
society chose three men to go through the county and discuss the subject of 
temperance ; and I believe I was one of the number. I spent three weeks 
from home, preparatory to going before the county commissioners in the 
spring. We spent three days before the county commissioners. We have not 
had a license granted by our county commissioners from that time to this. 

Q. What is your opinion touching the plan proposed, to give discretionary 
powers to the various municipalities of the State ? 

A. I am decidedly opposed to that, from the fact that I have experienced 
the evils of it. Why the thing was so marked in my mind was that there is 
quite a number of young men in our town who formerly went to school to 
me, and whom I was formerly interested in, and who were formerly men of 
property, but would sometimes drink too much, a great deal too much, and 
thus cause trouble in their families. Being a doctor, I have had a great 
many opportunities of acquaintance with the families of the people of the 
place. I have found that these men would go to an adjoining town and get 
drunk. A number of these families have begged me to put my face against 
the whole thing ; because if these men went to Pittsfield to cattle shows, 
they would get drunk, while if they were confined to our place, it would not 
be so much. Of course there are some places in the town where they can get 
it, but not so much. 

Q. As a physician, would you restrict your condemnation to what is com- 
monly caused from excessive use ? 

A. I do not use a great deal of it. I use it somewhat, but I do not use it 
as much as others do. The question has been asked in reference to the use 
of brandy in typhoid fevers. I can say that I have not lost a case, in ten 
years, except one. I use nothing stronger than port wine or quinine. I do 
not use brandy, I do not use rum, and I do not want it, and my patients get 
along well ; and I tell my neighboring physicians that I get along better. 
That is my opinion in regard to it. 

Q. Do you regard them as hurtful or healthful, used in moderation ? 

A. I consider them hurtful. 

Q. Do you lay that down as a rule ? 

A. I would lay that down as a rule. 

Q. Would you include wine ? 

A. I would include any liquors. 

Q. You would not deem the measure of imperfection of health a justifica- 
tion of the evil ? 

A. I should not. 

Q. But you would think them harmful in life ? 

A. I would. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How long since there has been any license in Berk- 
shire County ? 

A. Our commissioners have not licensed since the time which I spoke of. 

Q. How long ago was that ? 

A. I think it was about twenty years. 



APPENDIX. 763 

Q. Have you any idea that under any system of legislation, if the ques- 
tion of license were left to the people of Berkshire County as it was then, 
there would be any license ? 

A. I do not believe Berkshire County would grant licenses. I would say 
this, sir : that previous to the question being considered here, if it had been 
left to the people, I do not know what the people would have done ; but I 
find as I go about the country, that some who have been vacillating with 
regard to the propriety of having a license, are now decided that they 
should not favor it — that what has been going on in this State House has con- 
vinced them of the evils of the thing. 

Q. There would be no doubt if that thing were left to the people of your 
oounty ? 

A. I do not know that it would. 

Q. If the present law remained, would it make any difference in the prac- 
tical results in your county, with the same means of enforcement, whether 
the prohibition came from the action of the people or from the action of the 
State ? 

A. "Well, I do not think, sir, that we should ever have any different con- 
dition of the sale of ardent spirits in our county than at present. I think 
this Constabulary system is doing the thing entirely. 

Q. Yes, sir; and nobody proposes to set aside the means here used. 
Provided that the people of the towns say that they do not want it, and you 
say that your county would not license, and if you then had the very means 
here employed would it make any difference among the great mass of your 
people, whether the permission to sell was withheld by a law of the State or 
by the action of the people of the county ? 

A. No, sir ; but I should be very sorry to have Massachusetts go back. 

Q. Well, will you be kind enough, if you please, to give us your opinion. 

A. Give me your question exactly. 

Q. The question was, so far as the question of temperance is concerned, 
as a beverage or anything else, in Berkshire County (and you say that you 
had no licenses granted), would it make any difference if that power was 
withheld by the action of the people of the county, or whether it was with- 
held by the action of the State ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think it would make a great difference. And I do not 
want, after men have taken the stand that they have, that we should have it 
come into Berkshire County as a test question. I think it would tend to injure 
public morals. It would tend to demoralize the whole thing. As to the pre- 
cise effect upon the people in our town, it would not be the same whether it 
came from one kind of people or another. I think persons would drink more 
and that more would be sold. 

Q. Would drink more ? 

A. Where they could get it. Drink in Pittsfielcf, if you please. 

Q. Is there any difficulty in getting it in New York, or in Vermont ? 

A. There are no licenses at all in Vermont. And I was told that in the 
town of Pownal, they were going to stop the sale entirely. And there is an 
organization in Bennington by which they will entirely stop it. 



764 APPENDIX. 

Q. Has there been any difficulty in getting liquors in Troy, or in Boston, 
all that is wanted ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would they not get it in Boston if it was licensed, or if it was not 
licensed ? What difference does it make whether it is licensed or not ? 

A. In our place the leading men do not drink. Those who drink are Irish ; 
and they cannot send to Boston to get it. 

Q, Has there ever been a time under the prohibitory system, when they 
could not get all they wanted ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. They do not get it from Berkshire I suppose ? 

A. I do not know that they do not get it from Berkshire. 

Q. They do not get it from Williamstown, but they do get it, do they not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. With a license law, if people please to get it in Troy, there will be no 
difficulty in getting it, will there ? 

A. They can get it in Troy or Boston ; but we are not any further off 
from Boston or from Troy than we were ten years ago. And yet, as Dr. 
Hopkins has just stated here upon the stand, one of the largest town meetings 
that we ever held in our town was this spring ; and the same question 
came up there that agitated the community ; and I do not think there was a 
man in our town meeting who had drank anything — 

Q. What I wanted to inquire was, if since the prohibitory law in your 
county does not prevent people from getting liquor in Troy and Boston, it 
would be any worse for you whether they got it in Troy or in Boston under a 
license system, or otherwise ? 

A. If they get it in Troy, they will drink it. 

Q. But if you assume that they can get it in all these places, how is it 
going to produce a benefit ? 

A. I assume that all these places are to be shut up. And I assume further- 
more that if I was in the town of Pittsfield, and could associate with me forty 
men there, I could shut up every place there. 

Q. Then you would have it so that nobody could get it ? That is, you 
would expect to accomplish that by law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you believe that, by this law or any other, such a state of things 
eould exist ? 

A. Well, sir, if I live until the millennium, I might. 

Q. Then the law is not going to destroy the use of liquors ? 

A. Only just so far as the people rise up and sustain it. There are two 
ways : one is, that they cannot get it, and the other is that the poor drunkard 
shall see that those to whom they look are sincere in their efforts to stop the 
sale. 

Q. If these people find that a large portion of the people in the community 
(people in the higher walks of life, if you prefer to use that term) are in the 
habit of using it, can you reclaim them under this system ? 

A. Yes, sir, I think we can. I will say this: I was in Pittsfield three 
weeks ago, and I met a man there who said to me, We have got an organi- 



APPENDIX. 765 

zation going on in this place, and we have got seventy-five members in it 
now. I knew him to be a drunkard. And we are taking in, he said, some ten 
or fifteen more each night, and we shall have an organization which will show 
that the liquor can be taken care of. And that society originated in the lower 
class of society. 

Q. Do you think that it is as easy to enforce any law in Boston as it is in 
Berkshire ? 

A. No, sir; and I do not think it is as easy in Pittsfield as it is in Wil- 
liamstown. 

Q. Do you think it is, without the co-operation of the people in these 
different places ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Now, suppose the fact to be such that under a certain system of legis- 
lation you can procure it, and that under another you cannot. Which would 
you prefer ? 

A. I would prefer to have legislative action right. 

Q. Irrespective of right ? 

A. It would be right. 

Q. But if it is in Boston, it is more difficult. Do you think the people of 
Boston cannot as well judge in regard to themselves as they can in Berk- 
shire ? 

A. If I was an inhabitant of the city of Boston, it would be the first busi- 
ness of my life to go to one good man and another throughout the city, and 
I would work while I lived, to bring up the public to such a standard. 

Q. But must it not be left to the people of Boston ? 

A. It must be left to the people, and good people must be responsible. 

Q. Will the prohibitory law, without this co-operation, have any material 
effect ? 

A . They must go together. 

Q. Then what you desire in Boston is to secure the co-operation of every- 
body to exert an influence on this side ? 

A. We want a law, and then we want that. 

Q. Do you think it is calculated to produce that co-operation, by a statute 
on your statute book, which implies that all persons who use it are on all 
occasions guilty of an offence ? 

A. I do not know as you are going to put anything on the statement. I 
answer that I would not give a body alcohol or prussic acid. 

Q. Now, I want to know if you think it is at all probable that these gen- 
tlemen will come and lend their co-operation, while they are held out by the 
law of the State as guilty of moral wrong, crime and sin in drinking ? 

Q. (By Mr. Sabin.) Which class of people ? The rumsellers ? 

A. (By Mr. Child.) No, sir, people of the community. 

A. Why I should think that the good people of the city of Boston would 
come right up to the sustaining of the law at once. I recollect, in 1857, 
sitting here in this very place, and my friend, Mr. Day, was in the lower house, in 
which this subject was before us ; and I never was so affected as I was, in the 
committee upon the subject, to hear the testimony of old Father Cleveland, 
relating what he was doing in the city of Boston. I must say I sat and 



766 APPENDIX. 

cried under the old man's testimony. I asked him where he got money, and 
he said that when he got out of money he went up to Amos Lawrence, and 
he was always ready to give him fifty or a hundred dollars to sustain him while 
he was helping to lead up the poor drunkards. 

Q. Is there any considerable amount used in Berkshire County ? 

A. Yes, sir ; they give ten dollars a barrel for it for manufacturing pur- 



Q. Do they drink very much ? 

A. They do some. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) You would not have any legislation about it ? 

A. I would let it stand just as it is. 

Q. You think that a person who is* fortunate enough to live in the country 
can make his own cider and use it, while the man who lives in Boston is not 
to be allowed to purchase it ? 

A. That is a matter that I cannot legislate upon. I think this cider 
business is pretty miserable business. I labored with a man in our place (for 
I .have labored some in this cause), to stop his drinking cider. He had 
stopped everything else. But his wife said to me one day, — " For mercy's 
sake, do let that man go to drinking rum again, but don't let him drink 
cider, for he is sour and cross all the time now." I think drinking cider is 
pretty bad business. 

Q. You admit the difficulty of managing this thing in Boston ? What 
difficulty do you see in having the law so modified as to. leave to the people 
of Boston themselves to determine ? 

A. I do not know about Boston. You do too large a business for me 
here. 

Q. You say that the law cannot be carried out without this sentiment on 
the part of the people ? 

A. I think the state of things in Boston, the hub of the State, and the 
" hub of the universe," may be illustrated by a story, if I may be permitted 
to tell a story here to illustrate. An old lady was talking with her minister 
in regard to total depravity. She thought that people were all totally 
depraved. And the minister asked her if she thought that she was totally 
depraved herself. Said she, " if you take away my total depravity, there is 
nothing left of me." And if it is going to destroy Boston to take away rum, 
I do not know what is to be left of it. 

Q. You would not then be willing to leave her to take care of herself ? 

A. No, sir. Boston is a part of me. 

Q. You think you can manage it up in Berkshire County ? 

A. No, sir; but I have my ideas of the propriety of things in Boston, 
even living up in Berkshire County, as well as if I lived here. 

Q. But you are not quite willing to leave us to take care of ourselves, as 
you are to leave the people up in Berkshire County to take care of them- 
selves ? 

A. I want to have it just the same. 



APPENDIX. 767 

Testimony of G. F. Lewis. 
Q. (By Mr. Spooxer.) Where do you reside ? 

A. In Cleveland, Ohio. I am representative of a banking house in 
Detroit, Michigan. 

Q. You are connected with a business firm which buys the scrip of the 
agricultural colleges. 

A. Yes, sir; our house purchases the scrip of the agricutural colleges of 
the different States. 

Q. I would like to know the state of the temperance feeling in Ohio. Is 
it rising ? 

A. It is very strongly rising among the people West, especially among the 
Christian people, and those anxious to advance Christianity. 

Q. What is your law in Ohio ? 

A. I can hardly tell you the details of our law. We had a license law 
for a time, but we found that it did not work well, and we are looking with a 
very great anxiety to see how you enforce your prohibitory law in New Eng- 
land, and to Massachusetts as the head of New England. You are our 
fathers and mothers, and we look to you here for wise men. 

Q. Do they have a particular regard for Massachusets ? 

A. Of course we do. Here is where our fathers and mothers were born, 
and we look here in this matter as we look here for ideas of Christianity ; 
and it is here that we look for a preponderance of ideas. If you are able to 
carry out your law here, we think that we shall be able to carry it out with 
us, so that there thall be no more rum manufactured, and that the use of it 
shall be abolished the same way as we have abolished slavery. 

Q. Is the sentiment there pretty strong ? 

A. It is very earnest. There are different opinions in this respect, of 
course, and there is a class of people that are eternally ready to halt ; but we 
have societies for temperance, and there is quite an active movement in the 
West. 

Q. So that the temperance people are anxious to see us sustain this law ? 

A, Yes, sir. Their whole hearts are awakened about it, and the day will 
come when we will abolish rum, if you will sustain your law here. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How much whiskey do you make in Ohio ? 

A. I cannot tell. I have no statistics upon that matter. I am more par- 
ticularly acquainted with the moral bearings. It is there where I live. 

Q. But we are obliged to come down to the affairs of this world when we 
come to the business of legislation. You and I would not expect to promote 
morals very much by an act of legislation. Now, is not whiskey very largely 
manufactured in Ohio, and all down the Mississippi ? And is not the beverage 
as common as the water in Ohio ? 

A. I should think not as common. 

Q. Not quite ? Have you any idea of the amount of grain raised in Ohio 
which is sold and used for the manufacture of whiskey ? 

A. I have not got the statistics. 

Q. Have you got any idea of it ? 

A. I have no opinion of any statistics to go by. 

Q. For the purpose of finding out what the quantity used is ? 



768 APPENDIX. 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you think that half of the corn is used for that purpose ? 

A. I have no " think " on that point. 

Q. Would you follow our example ? 

A. We follow Massachusetts. 

Q. Is there any legal restraint, at all, in the Western States, upon the sale 
of liquor at the present time, so far as you know ? 

A. Yes, sir, there is. 

Q. Does it have any effect upon the consumption ? 

A. Well, the laws do seem to have considerable effect. 

Q. Is there any law that has existed in the Western States, that has pre- 
vented people from drinking if they wanted it ? 

A. I could not give you the details of the laws. 

Q. We would like to compare your laws with our own. 

A. Well, sir, they are not quite up to your standard. 

Q. Are they not below our standard ? 

A. They are. 

Q. Are they not so far that you can hardly see between them ? 

A. I should think not quite so far as that. 

Q. Have you any idea what the amount of tax is which you have to pay on 
the whiskey that you send out of Ohio ? 

A. No, sir. I am not a statistician ; but I would respectfully refer you to 
the Commissioner of Internal Revenue at Washington. 

Q. Do you think that the habit of total abstinence is in any way so far 
advanced in the West as it is in Massachusetts ? 

A. No, sir; nor Christianity. 

Q. You would make that comparison with the Eastern States generally ? 

A. Yes, sir; but Massachusetts is the head of the whole lump. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I want to know what the general belief is in 
Ohio, as to whether it is common to add spirits or to add water to the wines 
which are manufactured there ? 

A. It was found in an examination before a Committee of the Legislature, 
that Mr. Longworth, among others, had been found to enforce his liquors. 
And we had a man appointed to examine them all ; and that regulation has 
been enforced pretty well. 

Testimony of Dr. Ebenezer Alden. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Where do you live ? 

A. In Randolph. 

Q. Are you a physician by profession ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How many years have you been in practice ? 

A. A good while, sir. I took the first degree in 1811 and the second in 
1812. 

Q. Will you state to the Committee your views of the influence of alcoholic 
beverages upon men in ordinary health, but used in what is commonly called 
" moderation ? w 



APPENDIX. 769 

A. I have come to this conclusion in relation to this subject, that such 
liquors are not necessary to men in ordinary health, but that the tendency of 
the use of them is injurious in many ways, and especially in two — by laying 
the foundation in the individual of an intemperate appetite, and secondly by 
their example upon other people. 

Q. We have had much said of the dietetical value of especially the lighter 
beverages. Have you any opinion in regard to that ? 

A. I have this general opinion upon that subject, that although I should 
not undertake to place myself in opposition to the young men in relation to 
chemistry, I would not say, in respect to alcoholic liquors, no nutriment could 
possibly be extracted from any of them — I would not say that — but I say this, 
that if the doctrine that alcoholic liquors are food is chemically right, it is 
practically wrong; that the influence of such an opinion, authoritatively 
expressed, would, in its effect upon the community, be injurious. That is the 
general impression I have in relation to that matter. 

Q. Are you able to believe that the alcohol of the beverages has this 
nutritive power or quality in any valuable measure ? 

A. That point is a disputed point. When you come to that particular 
point it is one disputed by many chemists. My own impression is, that as 
alcohol, there is very little nutriment, and so mixed up with other matters 
that the nutriment, if any, in it, is not the particular reason why people use it 
I hold, in the first place, that alcohol is alcohol everywhere ; and, in the 
the second place, I hold that the use of alcohol is injurious to a man in health, 
in the ways in which I state it. My main point is this : the reason I object to 
the use of alcohol and alcoholic liquors, is on account of their general ten- 
dency. I believe their general tendency to be evil, and I believe that the use 
of alcohol as a beverage in any way, however temperately used, leads to an 
intemperate use, and that therefore every man, in the first place, should 
abstain from the use of those liquors on his own account, and I believe he 
should do it on account of his neighbors. That brings me to the point before 
us — whether the sale of alcoholic liquors should be licensed by the State, and 
my opinion upon that subject is, that the public safety requires that the sale 
of such liquors should not be licensed, and especially that the sale should not 
be licensed, for the purpose of beverages, in public houses and in groceries. 
They should be especially excluded from those places ; and if any one asks 
me my objection to granting licenses to public houses, I have only to lift my 
spectacles and you see that I have one eye not in very good condition. 

Q. Will you explain yourself in regard to that ? 

A. I was thrown over in a stage by a man who had been long driving the 
stage ; but he undertook to drive too rapidly once, and the occasion of his 
rapid driving, as I always supposed, was that he had too much liquor in his 
head. I lost my eye by the accident. That is one reason why I think liquor 
ought not to be freely sold. It ought to be excluded from public houses. If 
it is sold in these public houses the sale is made respectable. I think if it is 
sold at all it should be for legitimate purposes, as in medicine and in the arts. 
In regard to the use of alcohol and alcoholic preparations medicinally, I well 
remember the advice that was given to me, as a pupil, many years ago, by 
97 



770 APPENDIX. 

Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, and have endeavored to follow that advice in my 
practice. 

Q. Will you state in substance Dr. Rush's advice ? 

A. Dr. Rush was lecturing in the session of 1811-12, on the subject of 
chronic diseases, and the diseases of the digestive organs in particular. Dr. 
Rush said that the custom had been in such diseases to use to a great extent 
tinctures, bitters, &c. He said that he had seen very ill effects from the use 
of tinctures, some of which had occurred in his own practice. He said, " Gen- 
tlemen, I have a remark that I wish to make upon this subject, and in order 
that you may always remember it, I will rise and request you to rise also." 
Then in the most solemn manner, and in the most eloquent manner, (for he 
was a very eloquent speaker.) he said, " Gentlemen, I charge you as young 
men that are to have the care of sick persons, not to use tinctures in your 
practice in chronic diseases, if you can avoid it. I have decided not to do so 
in my own practice hereafter, for I have determined (the Lord helping me) 
that in the future no man shall be able to rise up in the judgment day, and 
say that Benjamin Rush made him a drunkard." 

I desire here to refer to some resolutions that express my own opinions in 
this matter. At the time they were passed I was a member of the medical 
society, and these are the resolutions of the Massachusetts Medical Society, 
and are connected with this very subject — the use of liquors medicinally, and 
their influence when thus used upon the community. These resolutions were 
passed because it was thought at that time that the use of alcohol and alco- 
holic preparations as medicine, had a deleterious effect upon the people. I 
will not read the whole of the resolutions unless desired, but will state the 
point very briefly. The resolutions were offered by Dr. Warren, the late 
John C. Warren, and passed with great unanimity. They are substantially 
this : — 

" Whereas, There is reason to believe that the habitual and temporary 
use of ardent spirits is often the consequence of an opinion that such liquids 
contribute to the health of man ; and Whereas, It seems to be a duty pecu- 
liarly belonging to this Society to oppose and correct so insidious an error, 
therefore, 

u 1. Resolved, That in the opinion of this Society the constant use of ardent 
spirits is not the source of strength and vigor, but that it is generally 
productive of weakness and disease. 

" 2. Resolved, That this Society agree to discourage the use of ardent 
spirits as much as lies in its power, and for these purposes discontinue the 
employment of spirituous preparations medicinally whenever they can find 
substitutes, and when compelled to use them for any great length of time, will 
warn the patient against forming unconquerable and fatal habits. 

" 3. Resolved, That the excessive and constant use of wine is, in the opin- 
ion of this Society, the cause of many diseases, and that although it is useful 
in some of them, as in stages of weakness in fever, its use in these cases is 
often carried too far and continued too long. 

" 4. Resolved, That in the opinion of this Society the most salutary drink 
for the general use of men is water, and that even this pure liquid must be 
employed in a rational and discreet manner, and especially in hot weather, 
;and that if we were called upon to recommend some drink of a more stimu- 
lating character, we should advise the use of malt liquors. 

"5. Resolved, That this Society use its endeavors to ascertain the best 
mode of removing the evil of intemperance, and for that purpose a premium 
of fifty dollars shall be offered for an essay upon that subject." 



APPENDIX. 771 

All these resolutions were passed without a single dissenting voice, with the 
exception of the fourth, concerning malt liquors. Respecting that, some of us 
did not quite approve it, and thought it had better be left out. The disserta- 
tion referred to in the last resolution was brought forward and read in the 
Society two years afterwards, and I will leave a copy of it in the hands of 
the Committee, to do with it as they desire. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What year was this ? 

A. In 1827. The dissertation goes on to show the ill-effects of distilled 
liquors as beverages. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you regard indigestion as a direct result of the 
constant or continuous use of even moderate doses of alcoholic beverages ? 

A . It is a very frequent result. The operation of ardent spirits, like 
other medicines, is very different under different circumstances. 

Q. In regard to your interpretation of the phrase " excessive and constant 
use of wine," would you apply the word " excessive " to a frequency that leads 
to inebriety, or merely to the continuous use of smaller doses ? 

A. It must be confessed that in 1827 some of us had not our eyes opened 
upon this subject. I confess that mine were not opened. I considered, at 
that time, that there was a question about what was meant by excessive use. 
It was not familiarly known in the community then that alcohol was alcohol 
in every case. It was not known that alcohol in distilled liquors was precisely 
the same thing as alcohol wherever you find it ; that by certain re-agents 
alcohol can be obtained from wine without distillation. I was brought up 
under old Dr. Dexter, the chemist. My first course of lectures was at Har- 
vard College. He did not go into that subject, neither did the gentleman I 
was with afterwards. 

Q. That does not answer my question touching the word " excessive." 
There is a continuous implication here, if not a direct assertion, that the steady, 
continuous, moderate use, within the limits of sobriety (without rising to 
inebriety), of lighter liquids, such as wine, especially, is useful. You speak 
of the constant an<j. " excessive " prescription of it in diseases. Do you apply 
the word " excessive " to the use which leads to inebriety ? 
• A. You must take that word in connection with the temptations and with 
the results and with the circumstances and with the views entertained at that 
time. My views now are somewhat modified from what they were at that 
time. I now think that any use of alcohol as a beverage is an excessive use, 
and a wrong done by man to man ; that his own personal safety requires that 
he should let alone all alcoholic liquors, upon the ground of his personal 
safety, lest he should himself fall into the habit of intemperance. From all 
the observations I have made, I find that of all persons who use alcoholic 
liquors as a beverage, a certain percentage become intemperate, and many of 
them die drunkards. I had occasion to look into this subject as long ago as 
when these resolutions were passed. I was invited to give a temperance lec- 
ture about that time, the first ever given in the place, and I wanted some facts. 
I looked to see who were posted up as drunkards. I was perfectly astonished 
to find that one out of every twenty-five of the legal voters of the town in 
which I lived were posted as drunkards. 

Q. In what year was that ? 



772 APPENDIX. 

A. I should think the last posting of drunkards was in 1823. I looked at 
the list in 1826. I stated that fact at the lecture. I also stated the fact after- 
wards in the town of East Bridgewater, and a doctor who heard me make the 
statement, assured me it was not so in that town, and thought that the people 
where I lived must be very drunken indeed, if so large a proportion were 
posted as one in twenty-five. I asked him if he knew pretty well all the peo- 
ple in the town. He said that he did. I asked him if he Would be kind 
enough to make me out a little list of the drunkards. He did so, and I kept 
the count, knowing the number of legal voters there, until I said, " Please 
stop, Doctor, you are beyond me." He said that he had no idea the propor- 
tion was so large. I stated the same fact publicly in the town of Franklin, in 
the presence of Dr. Emmons, and he afterwards made the same remark to 
me, — that we must have a very drunken population in the town where I lived, 
and assuring me that such was not the fact in the town of Franklin. Another 
physician in the place was sitting by, and afterwards said that he did not wish 
to dispute with Dr. Emmons, but assured me that he was well acquainted 
with the town, and assured me that my statement would apply to Franklin as 
well, and he gave me the figures, and they were just about the same. I have 
reason to think, therefore, that of those who use liquor as a beverage and 
habitually, a certain ratio become drunkards ; and I think that every Chris- 
tian man, especially, ought not only to abstain himself, but by his example 
and influence endeavor to prevent others from using it. That is my idea* 
Ever since I voted for those resolutions, I have endeavored to act in accord- 
ance with them, and my experience in the use of liquor, medicinally, is sub- 
stantially that of Dr. Sabin, who has testified, only I would not undertake to 
say that I think myself very much more successful than other people. I do 
not know about that — others must be the judge. I am satisfied that there is a 
great deal too much liquor used as medicine ; that the medical use is doing an 
immense mischief by creating an intemperate appetite. That was the opinion 
of Dr. Rush, and my own experience corroborates it. I think we ought to 
avoid it whenever we can find substitutes. I claim a right to use any medi- 
cine that will save my patient, however dangerous it may be ; but at the same 
time, if I must use dangerous medicine, I must use as little as possible, and 
must give my patient notice that he must be very careful that it does not lead 
him astray. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) You would use arsenic in that way, I 
suppose ? 

A. Certainly, I should use arsenic if I found it necessary, but I do not 
believe if I put a teaspoonful of flour into a pound of arsenic, and then some- 
body takes it up and extracts a certain portion of nutriment from it, that it 
would be proper therefore to label it " nutriment." I should rather let the old 
name remain. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) We hear much of the prescription of whiskey for 
pulmonary diseases. I desire to ask whether the valuable property of such 
prescriptions is commonly supposed to be the fusel oil that whiskey contains ? 

A. You must ask the chemist about that. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) The resolutions you have just now read were 
passed forty years ago, were they not ? 



APPENDIX. 773 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the statistics and facts you gave in regard to the state of temper- 
ance in your neighborhood relate to a period of time now between forty and 
forty-five years ago ? 

A. They were to about the years from 1823 to 1830. 

Q. Does that state of things continue to this day ? 

A. No, sir; that state of things does not continue. After this effort in 
1826 the whole community, as you are well aware, were aroused upon the sub- 
ject of temperance, and a great effort was made. We had a license law in 
operation at that time, licenses were given to retailers and to tavern-keepers, 
and the amount of liquor sold was so great, and its influence was so bad, that 
we felt we were liable, as some of our English friends expressed it, of becom- 
ing a nation of drunkards. The agitation of the temperance reform was then 
:ommenced, and men who feared that result, men who wished for the public 
good, were united in the use of moral suasion and in endeavors to persuade 
all men that liquors were not needed for well men, that they were not adapted 
to their use, and that they had better let them alone. A great deal was accom- 
plished at that time. We got up temperance societies. We obtained the 
names of large numbers to the pledge, the names of males, females and 
children. We put them all in and endeavored to get them in our Sabbath 
schools if we possibly could. At that time we had in a population of about 
twenty-two hundred, eleven retailers and three tavern-keepers, and one of 
those eleven retailers who, perhaps, sold a little more than the average, told 
me afterwards that he sold in one year about that time twenty-one hundred 
gallons of liquor. So you may judge something of the difficulties we had to 
contend with. But we went through successfully to a certain extent. Two 
of those retailers could not be persuaded to leave the business. One of them 
sold liquor to an intemperate man whose wife was a patient of mine. She 
became sick, was confined, and that retailer sold liquor to her husband, know- 
ing his character and the situation of his family, and he got drunk, came home 
in a cold easterly storm and got into bed with his wife and little child, and 
the consequence was a severe fever. I said to myself, there must be something 
more done ; we must stop the business. Other friends of temperance united 
with me. We tried for two years before we succeeded. We employed coun- 
sel ; we went before the County Commissioners and gave our testimony against 
the dealers, and they refused in consequence to grant licenses, and we have 
never had a retail license granted in that town since. I want a prohibitory 
law continued now to protect the people where it is impossible to exercise a 
proper influence upon the dealers by moral suasion. I want to be protected 
in my rights, and I want to see others protected, and the dealers kept from 
injuring the community. 

C}. You state that between forty and fifty years ago, there was one for 
every twenty-five who was posted as a drunkard ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Does that state of things continue to the present time ? 

A. I have no statistics now, but I am very sure there is no such thing. If 
you exclude the Catholic population it certainly does not exist. I do not 
believe it exists, now as then , but I cannot give you statistics. 



774 APPENDIX. 

Q. Have you any doubt that there has been a very great progress made in 
the direction of sobriety in your town, and everywhere else in the Common- 
wealth during the last fifty years ? 

A. No, sir, I have not the least doubt. I know there has been great 
progress made. I know that intemperance was exceedingly rife during the 
early years of my recollection. When the " not-drink-too-much-societies " 
were organized in 1812, they tried to do what they could to suppress intem- 
perance, but they succeeded only partially. They did a little, but the tem- 
perance cause was not really successful until we signed a pledge for our own 
sake and for the sake of others, to drink nothing that could intoxicate. 

Q. For the last half century, there has been a great, marked and almost 
continual progress made, has there not V 

.4 . It has not always been exactly uniform. 

Q. I do not mean uniform, but it has been continuous, has it not ? 

A. There has been progress just as far as by public suasion 

Q. I want to get at the fact, whether your opinion is either one way or the 
other, whether you think or do not think that there has been a general, con- 
tinuous progress for the last half a century in the direction of sobriety ? 

A. I think there has been progress. 

Q. Do you not think that the same fact is true of New England as well as 
of Massachusetts ? 

A. I have not so good an opportunity to judge. I have lived several years 
of that period in New Hampshire, and am pretty well conversant with the 
state of things there. 

Q. Do not your reading as well as your personal observation assert the 
fact, that this is true also of the civilized world ? Is it not true of other parts 
of this country, and also true of the British Islands ? 

A. I had rather confine myself to facts that I am acquainted with. 

Q. Then your studies have not included that branch of the subject ? 

A. My studies have included my professional and personal observation 
mainly. 

Q. Fifty years ago there was a considerably different state of things in 
society in respect to soberness and drunkenness, from the state of things that 
now exist — that is true, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think so. 

Q. Has there not been a considerable change in the form of diseases, or of 
many diseases during that time ? Do not doctors very commonly remark of 
such and such diseases, that they have to be treated very differently now in a 
majority of cases from the way they had to be treated years ago ? 

A. I believe there is a change in the type of diseases in different periods. 
There was a great difference in my opinion between the years 1806 and 1816 
and the ten years that followed after. The diseases were more inflamatory 
during the first part of that period, from 1809 (of which I can speak very 
distinctly from my own knowledge), and the spotted fever was prevailing then. 
In the first part of that epidemic, it was needed to use spirits, as we thought, 
very extensively, but in the course of a few years there was a change. When 
I returned to Massachusetts a few years after, I found that the opinions of 
physicians were very different from what they were at that time. 



APPENDIX. 775 

Q. Are you not aware that the medical judgment of the best writers now 
is that, in the old world as well as in this country, it is now necessary to 
stimulate very much more than it used to be fifty or a hundred years ago, 
when a majority of all the patients were already suffering more or less from 
over-stimulation ? 

A. I think that the physicians of the old country have always recom- 
mended more stimulants than seemed to me necessary or proper. 

Q. That is not quite an answer to my question. I ask you whether expe- 
rience has not proved that during later times — during the present 
generation — it is necessary in the treatment of diseases to stimulate much 
more than it was considered necessary, fifty or a hundred years ago, when the 
patients were so commonly already suffering under over-stimulation, when 
they came under the doctors' hands ? In modern times, patients come under 
the doctors' treatment, not suffering from over-stimulation, but needing stimu- 
lation. In those times, they were already over-stimulated, and they suffered 
in consequence of it. Is not that a fact as recorded and declared by leading 
medical authorities, both abroad and at home ? 

A. I had rather give my impressions than the opinions of other men, if it 
is equally agreeable to you. 

Q. You have been giving your own, but I want now to see what is your 
knowledge of existing medical authority. 

A. My reading would lead me to suppose that there is a difference 
of opinion upon that subject. I think that stimulating medicines are used at 
this time to a far greater extent than they should be. 

Q. Are you not aware that Dr. Carpenter supports the use of mild alco- 
holic drinks as a part of the diet of feeble persons not yet diseased ? 

A. If I was aware of it, or if it is a fact, that would not alter my opinion. 
My opinion is, that such use is injurious. 

Q. I want to see how far your opinion corresponds with other authorities. 

A. My opinion is, as I stated in the beginning, that as a beverage, alcoholic 
stimulants ought not to be used at all as medicine. They ought to be used 
with great care, and only in such quantities and for such a length of time as 
is necessary in the judgment of a judicious physician. I should like to add 
one other point, — that the community, at this moment, is suffering most 
intensely from allowing certain articles to be put into the apothecaries' shops, 
and sold and used as tonics, the use of which is mainly to promote intemper- 
ance. That is their undoubted effect. And having seen a great deal of the 
use of preparations of that sort, it has led me to believe that the use of dis- 
tilled spirits, in any form, to any great extent, is not needful for persons in 
ordinary health, or to persons not under the care of a physician ; and when 
the time comes that a person requires any alcoholic liquor as a beverage it 
should be administered under the direction and particular care of a regularly 
acknowledged physician, and that he should never be his own physician in 
such use. 

Q. I am endeavoring to find out what should be done by persons who need 
medical advice, and what rules should govern the physician in administering 
such stimulants. 

A . His own judgment. 



776 APPENDIX. 

Q. I began with you upon the bases of the medical resolutions passed forty 
or fifty years ago. In your remarks just now, yon condemn the use of all 
alcoholic stimulants, unless administered under the direction of a physician. 
You consider those stimulants injurious in themselves, and as having a great 
tendency to make men drunkards, although taken under those modified 
circumstances, and in great moderation ? 

A. So much so that I feel it my duty to caution my patients when admin- 
isterir.g them. 

Q. Now are you not aware that Dr. James Jackson, who was the Nestor 
of your profession until he retired from it recently, in a letter to a young phy- 
sician a few years ago, testified that, after forty years' experience, during 
which he had been in the habit of administering these stimulants to people 
of all ages, from children in the age of dentition up to extreme old age, he 
had never, save in one instance, seen a patient (and he had carefully observed 
in order to know) brought into dangerous habits in respect to drink, and in 
that one instance the patient was a lady ? — that the occurrence happened 
twenty years before he wrote the book, that he warned her of the danger and 
that she avoided it and proceeded no further ? Are you not aware that this 
was the testimony of that venerable man, from careful observations, during an 
extended practice of forty years ? 

A. I am aware of it, and I am aware that physicians may differ upon 
that subject, although I claim Dr. Jackson as a personal friend and one whom 
I highly esteem. I once had occasion to speak in relation to that subject 
before the society, and on one occasion when I said some things that were 
not exactly agreeable to him in relation to that topic, he spoke a little harshly 
to me, but afterwards came to me when the meeting was adjourned and said, 
" Doctor, I want you to go and dine with me. I respect you, I believe you 
are an honest man and desirous of promoting the interests of the profession." 
The subject under consideration had some relation to excluding wine from 
our public table. Dr. Jackson is a most excellent man, I respect him highly, 
but I think he is not correct in this matter. 

Q. We have reached a class of questions concerning which the observa- 
tions and the experience as well as the theories of the most practical and 
highest scientific minds in the world to some extent differ. Is not that so ? 

A . Yes, sir. But I do not see that that has any relations to a license law. 

Q. On that difference do you think that the General Court can base 
legislation by taking sides one way or the other, either with you upon the one 
hand or Dr. Jackson upon the other ? Must not the General Court rather 
base its legislation upon the principles which leave open to the scientific and 
practical medical mind those still further opportunities to work out those 
more exact and better ascertained conclusions ? 

A. I do not consider that the legislation has any relation to the medical 
question involved in this discussion. I do not consider it so. I ask that the 
selling of liquors may be prohibited, not as alcohol, not as medicine ; but 
that the common sale and use of liquor may be prevented. 

Q. Then what you desire to have broken up is the tippling shop, the 
drinking saloon and the dram bar ? 

A. And all other places where it is sold, especially in public houses. 



APPENDIX. 777 

Q. You want the dram bars broken up ? 

A. I want to have the prohibitory law executed ; that is all. 

Q. That is so general a phrase that it means nothing. You do not expect 
to drive alcoholic stimulants or alcoholic stimulation out of human society, 
because just now you have made special reservation for medication. 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Therefore you do not expect nor want to drive it out, neither do you 
want to exclude it from the manufactures or arts ? 

A. I have nothing at all to do with that. 

Q. But what you do want, as I suppose, is to break up the tippling shops 
and the places where drams are sold ? 

A. I want to make the sale of liquor anything but respectable. I do not 
want it sold in any public places where my children or my neighbors' children 
shall be led astray by its sale. 

Q. Supposing the Legislature should pass a resolve that the sale of alco- 
holic liquors is not respectable, would that make it any the less respectable ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Suppose they should say it was not respectable for a man to wear a 
brown coat, that would not make it so. The respectability of a thing must 
depend upon its internal character, must it not ? 

A. The tendency of the thing is decisive of its character, and that is the 
reason why I want to abolish the sale of liquor. 

Q. But you do not want to abolish the thing itself? 

A. I want to abolish it as an article to be used as a beverage. I want to 
abolish it as far as I can by my persuasion, and then I want to abolish it where 
I cannot reach persons by persuasion, by law, and abolish the article so com- 
pletely that it cannot be obtained without great difficulty. I would make the 
sale of liquor disreputable. 

Q. Then as I understand you, what you desire is, to make it extremely 
difficult for people to get liquor ? 

A. Yes, sir ; because there are so many intemperate people that will get it 
if they can, I want to make it difficult for them to get it. 

Q. Do you want to make it difficult for people to get it for proper uses ? 

A . I would make it difficult for them to get it for any but medical use. I 
want to make it so that people can obtain a better article for medical purposes 
than they now can. 

Q. Do you want to make it difficult for the manufacturers and artisans of 
this country to get the fifty million gallons that they use annually ? 

A. I do not have anything to do with that subject. I leave that entirely 
with the legislature. 

Q. Then you do not want to prevent them from getting any, but you want 
to prevent them from making an improper use of it after it is got. 

A. I am not aware that such articles are used in the arts to such an 
extent. 

Q. Have you ever looked over the returns of the town agents to our State 
Liquor Commissioner, and seen the proportion of Medford rum and whiskey, 
and such like articles, which are sold for medical and mechanical purposes 
and for the arts ? 

98 



778 APPENDIX. 

A. I suppose they are made into alcohol before they are used in the arts. 
My impression is that it was alcohol that they desired to use in the arts. 

Q. Do you suppose that you ever saw any pure alcohol in your life ? 

A. I have seen alcohol that went by that name. 

Q. Do you suppose that one apothecary in ten, in the city of Boston, ever 
saw any ? 

A. I should not undertade to speak of the experience of other men. I 
hope some of them have seen it. 

Q. Do you suppose that people engaged in mechanism, and the arts, to any 
great extent, use pure alcohol ? Do you suppose that pure alcohol is being- 
used by them ? 

A. In respect to that point, I stated in the beginning that I did not attend 
specially to chemistry. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I would like to ask a single question touching the 
period of which you make mention, when one man in every twenty-five voters 
was posted as a drunkard, whether or not there was a large number of other 
men who now-a-days would be termed moderate drinkers ? 

A. I stated at the time when the calculation was made, (and as the state- 
ment was not corrected I supposed that I was right in making it,) that on five 
roads leading from the town, I supposed there were just about as many ready 
to take the place of the drunkards as soon as they were left off the list. 

Q. So that the list of posted drunkards did not really include all immod- 
erate drinkers ? 

A. It only included those that were posted. Those were the persons whom 
the selectmen were required, on account of the injury they were doing to 
themselves and to their familes, to post up in the retailers' shops and forbid 
retailers selling to them. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Are you not perfectly well aware that in the 
United States Pharmacopoeia, our most eminent and standard work, the most 
eminent men, after detailing the medicinal effects of alcohol, especially caution 
physicians and all others from using it as a beverage, saying that its use is 
attended with the most deplorable consequences ? 

A . I recollect a very distinct statement in the United States Dispensatory 
in that respect, and suppose that similar statements are made in other medical 
authorities. 

Testimony of Dr. Josiah Bartlett. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) For how long a time have you been a medical 
practitioner ? 

A. In one place for forty-seven years. 

Q. What is your judgment of the desirableness of continuing the practice 
of moderate drinking ? 

A. In the early part of my practice my attention was called to the effects 
of intemperance. I saw more suffering, more sorrow, more wretchedness, 
more woe, more disease coming from that source than from any other, or from 
all others combined. I say this because I believe it to be perfectly true. 
From the year 1820 to 1836 liquor was sold as free as water to all comers. In 
the little town of Concord, with a population of less than twenty-one hundred, 



APPENDIX. 779 

liquor was sold in thirteen different places, and the requirement then was that 
liquor should not be sold to drunkards, that it should not be sold to minors, 
and that it should not be sold on the Sabbath. Every one of these restric- 
tions, excepting the one forbidding the sale of liquor on the Sabbath, was 
violated day in and day out. On the Sabbath the public stores were not 
open. I remember perfectly well of being told of one house in that village, 
from which, within thirty-five years prior to the time that the information 
was given me, thirty-five men and women — heads of families — had gone down 
to drunkards' graves. That statement made a deep impression upon my 
mind, and from that time I have endeavored to do what I could to stay this 
tremendous evil. 

Q. Are you in the habit of freely prescribing alcoholic remedies ? 

A. I do it as seldom as possible. There are cases of great prostration 
from profuse hemorrhage or other causes, where the stimulation of alcohol 
may be required ; but I have given it in very few instances. I think that the 
practice of some of our physicians, of recommending it in almost all cases of 
indisposition, and especially in consumption, with cod liver oil, has been pro- 
ductive of very injurious effects, not only to the patients themselves but to the 
community. 

Q. Do you think that it is advisable to license the sale of liquors and place 
them in the way of all parties ? 

A. In my opinion, most certainly not. 

Testimony of Dr. Nathan Allen. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Where do you live ? 

A. In Lowell. 

Q. For how many years have you been connected with the Board of 
State Charities ? 

A. Three years ; since the Board was organized. 

Q. You are a practising physician of Lowell ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. For how many years have you resided there ? 

A. Twenty-seven years. 

Q. Are you engaged in the continual practice of medicine as a profession ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Are there other physicians upon the Board of State Charities ? 

A. There are two others. 

Q. How many members are there of the Board ? 

A. There are seven members in all. 

Q. Will you state the results of your observations in general, or, if you 
prefer, with special reference to the inquiry now before this Committee ? 

A. Do you desire my opinion concerning intemperance as the cause of 
vice, poverty and crime ? 

Q. The relation of intemperance to poverty, disease and crime, and if you 
have arrived at any conclusions upon the subject, the effect upon the progeny 
of those who are accustomed to drink liquor ? 

A . I am not aware that at present there are any statistics, showing defi- 
nitely the relation of intemperance to crime. It must, in a measure, be a 



780 APPENDIX. 

matter of opinion derived from observation. In former times, very accurate 
statistics have been made in reference to poverty and crime, as connected 
with intemperance. In the matter of crime, I believe, however, that the 
matter was carefully investigated by our board last year, in connection with 
the houses of correction and the State Prison. The Secretary investigated 
the subject last year and reported that from three-fourths to four-fifths of the 
crime for which persons were inmates of the House of Correction and State 
Prison might be traced to intemperance. Other causes doubtless operate with 
this, rendering it difficult in many cases to make a separation. In the alms- 
houses, perhaps four-fifths of the inmates were brought there by intemperance. 
Some have estimated the proportion as larger than that. Many causes 
operate in connection with intemperance, especially with the foreign element, 
which is nearly nine-tenths of the entire number of inmates in the almshouses, 
and the proportion of the foreign element is equally large, in the insane 
department. Between five and six hundred persons are supported by the 
State in the insane asylum, and a large proportion of the cases of insanity are 
occasioned by intemperance. I believe that about one-half of the cases of 
insanity may be traced to intemperance. I refer now to the cases of insanity 
that are treated by the State in the public hospitals. That proportion will 
vary if you go out of the State institutions ; it will vary according to the 
classes that have become insane, whether from low life or high life. 

The great tendency of intemperance to depreciate the physical organization 
generally is a matter perhaps difficult to verify by accurate statistics, but it is 
one on which opinions do not differ. Intemperance takes away the capacity 
and vital force of the system, as well as the capacity of the brain, to support 
life ; I mean the ability to obtain a livelihood, and to be successful in any 
kind of business. The tendency in that direction as exhibited in our State 
institutions, is very marked and decided, but of course it is not confined there. 
The whole tendency and influence of intemperance is downward, both 
physically and mentally. These are influences which it is impossible to 
appreciate or fully comprehend. 

Q. Has the Board of State Charities felt called upon to express an opinion 
covering this general point ? 

A. Yes, sir. In the report made a year ago to the Legislature, in dis- 
cussing the dependent class and the criminal class in the community, they 
were led to investigate the causes of dependence and of crime. That subject 
was considered of radical and fundamental importance to the legislator. That 
report investigated the causes of poverty and crime, and also discussed the 
effect of intemperance upon hereditary descent. 

Q. In respect to prescribing alcoholic preparations, what is your opinion 
of the general usage of the medical profession ? 

A. I avoid such prescriptions as far as possible. I think that the medical 
profession exert an influence throughout the community that is difficult to 
appreciate fully. If we had organizations that were in a healthy state, as 
nature designed they should be, we probably should not find it necessary to 
prescribe alcoholic liquors ; but, taking human nature as we find it, their 
prescription is necessary to some extent, not as a beverage, but as medicine. 



APPENDIX. 781 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Are you in favor of retaining the present law 
just as it is ? 

A. Yes, sir. I have no objections to a license law in a State where a pro- 
hibitory law cannot be enforced. 

Q. Are you willing to have the law so changed as to leave the municipal- 
ities to decide the question of prohibition, subject to State supervision and 
control ? 

A. Yes, sir, in the cities. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do you base this opinion upon the assumption that 
the law cannot be executed in the cities, or do you base it upon your profes- 
sional judgment as to the utility of alcoholic beverages ? 

A. It is upon the first. 

Q. If, then, it should appear that the law could be executed in the cities, 
as well as the towns, you would reverse your judgment on that point ? 

A. I should, sir. 

Testimony of Dr. A. J. Bellows. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are a practitioner of medicine in the city of 
Boston ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Have you given much consideration to the subject of chemistry and 
physiology as applied to the preservation of health ? 

A. I have, perhaps, as any other man of my age, having for twenty years 
given, on an average, at least one lecture per week to classes of from one 
hundred to two hundred young ladies, upon the subject of chemistry and 
physiology as applied to the preservation of health. 

Q. I would like to know your opinion upon the question whether alcoholic 
drinks are useful for nutriment, and if so, to what extent ? 

A. As my opinion differs so essentially from that of the learned gentle- 
men who testified here last week, I would prefer to give the opinion of others 
whose opinion would be of more value. Dr. Carpenter is an English author 
upon physiology, whose book has been republished in this country, and is now 
the standard work in Harvard College represented in the catalogue, and 
recommended to the students as a standard work upon that subject. On page 
77 of his work on Physiology, Carpenter says : — 

" 1. It may be safely affirmed that alcohol cannot answer any one purpose 
for which the use of water is required in the system ; but on the other hand 
to antagonize many of those purposes. 

" 2. Alcoholic liquids cannot supply anything which is essential to the due 
nutrition of the system. 

" 3. The action of alcohol upon the living body is essentially that of stim- 
ulus, increasing for a time the vital activity of the body, but being followed 
by a corresponding depression of power, which is the more prolonged and 
severe in proportion as the previous excitement has been greater." 

Professor Wood, of Philadelphia, in his United States Dispensatory, says the 
habitual use of alcoholic drinks produces deplorable consequences. 

Professor Jacob Bigelow of Boston, and formerly a professor in Harvard 
University, expresses the same opinion as Dr. Carpenter, in Bigclow's Sequel. 



782 APPENDIX. 

Not having been so familiar with the books for a few years as others, I 
invited an intelligent student of Harvard University, just now completing his 
studies, to get for me any authority on this subject that was not.in accordance 
with that sentiment, and he informed me that he was not able to find any. 

The question is whether a stimulant can be nutritive. To my mind, it is 
precisely the same as asking the question whether the whip is a nutritive to 
the horse because it makes his muscles get stronger and makes him bring up 
the load to the top of the hill which he would not bring up but for the whip. 
That is my understanding of the influence of alcohol, and it is the only object 
for which I have ever used it. This is what all the books teach, but the pro- 
fessors as we have seen, teach differently. We had the testimony of four or 
five last week, that alcohol was nutritive. Now, it may be difficult to under- 
stand why the professors and their books should teach such different doctrines. 
I will give you an explanation in the words of one of these professors himself. 

Professor Oliver Wendell Holmes said, in an address before a medical 
society some three or four years ago, entitled " Currents and Counter-Currents 
in Medical Science P : — 

" The truth is, that medicine professedly founded on observation, is as sensi- 
tive to outside influences, political, religious, philosophical, imaginative, as is 
the barometer to the changes of atmospheric density." 

There have been, upon this subject, in exact accordance with the testimony 
just given by the professor, three distinct changes of opinions of medical men 
upon that subject. Forty-two years ago, when I was in that institution, almost 
everybody in Massachusetts drank. It was a common practice. Then, almost 
all the physicians administered alcohol as a medicine, and thought it right. 
Twenty or twenty-five years after, the public sentiment upon that subject had 
changed ; the pressure was so put on the doctors that they had that opinion 
forced out of them, and at that time no respectable man would have come 
here and made the statement that stimulant was nutritive. At that time, one 
of our leading men, Dr. Worthington Hooker, wrote an essay upon the evils 
of stimulation, stating, after a practice of twenty years, in cases of typhus fever 
of a certain form, in which the mortality had been very great, that he 
believed, after all, that it was an opium and brandy disease. He thought 
that the remedy was the cause of the disease, and recommended an entirely 
different course of treatment. 

Twenty years more have come over us, and the pressure is taken off, the 
mercury of the " barometer " falls, and we now have Prof. Holmes illustrating 
his own doctrine in these words : " Alcoholic combinations act dietetically 
upon the human system, as well as medicinally." Admitting that alcoholic 
combinations do act dietetically, I wish to inquire what excuse, or what 
reason we have for using them when we have everything that is necessary, 
furnished to our hands ? Nature has provided for man, that wherever he 
lives, whether with the polar bear in Greenland, or with the monkey under 
the equator, he can find warm and nourishing food adapted to the cold 
climate, or with the monkey in the hot regions, he has furnished him food 
cooling and proper for his system. Wherever he is, he can find just the right 
kind of nourishment that is adapted to his condition. If he is feverish, he can 



APPENDIX. 783 

have fruits which are cooling, or if cold, he can have sugar which is warming. 
Now under such circumstances what excuse have we for using a material 
obtained by .chemical process, when we have such arrangements made by 
God for the supply of every human being ? 

Q. There has been a great deal said about the formation and the destruc- 
tion of tissue. What, in your opinion, is the effect of alcohol upon the 
tissue ? 

A. Prof. Yeomans, of New York, says : 

"It has been demonstrated that alcoholic drinks prevent the natural 
changes going on in the blood and' obstruct the nutritive and reparative 
functions." 

Prof. Carpenter, in his Physiology, says : " Alcoholic drinks diminish the 
waste of the tissues ; " that is, they suspend the action of the brain and mus- 
cles and other organs and functions of the system, and if perseveringly con- 
tinued, bring us down to a state or torpidity, like snakes and toads and other 
cold-blooded animals, who preserve their tissues wonderfully, by masterly 
inactivity. Perhaps you have noticed a toad in the garden, sitting hour after 
hour, and day after day, with only energy enough to wink, or to catch a fly if 
it comes within an inch of his nose. He has a wonderful power of preserving 
the tissues. They will last for years and years if they are confined where 
they cannot get out, as they have been before now, in the bark of a tree. It 
seems to me that the toad is a very good personification of the bloated, beer- 
drinking, Pennsylvania Dutchman, who will sit from morning until night with 
just energy enough to lift a mug to his mouth and call for more when it is 
empty. The question occurs to my mind, whether such tissues are worth 
preserving. When I was a student, the doctrine was, that it was not best to 
preserve the tissues ; that it was best for a man to live in active exercise, to 
use his muscles and his brain, so as to exhaust the tissues and get new ones 
every day. It was never supposed that it was best to preserve the tissues. 

Q. You claim that this waste of tissue is a natural operation, which ought 
to go on ; is it ever excessive or continuous ? 

A. It is very seldom excessive. 

Q. Is there anything additional that you would like to say upon this 
subject ? 

A. I have some authorities that I would like to offer in reply to the 
strange positions taken by some of the learned gentlemen the other day. 

Q. We should like to hear you ? 

A. With regard to stimulants as a medicine, I have made some observa- 
tions. Keeping in mind that the synonyme of stimulant is a goad', I have no 
difficulty in coming to a conclusion when it is useful as a medicine. I have 
stood by the bed-side of a sinking patient, when the pulse was falling rapidly, 
and I have feared that nature would not be able to rally, and have given a 
stimulant, a goad to whip up poor sinking nature, and in a few moments the 
pulse would rise, but would fall again very soon. It might be carefully 
renewed until nature was able to devote some nourishment. I believe that 
patients may have been saved by the use of stimulants in such a manner. 
That is the only use that I have ever made of stimulants. There are some 
authorities upon that point to which I will refer.. 



784 APPENDIX. 

In his treaties on the Immediate Cause and the Specific Treatment of Pul- 
monary Phthisis, Dr. J. Francis Churchill, a celebrated French physician, 
quotes as follows from a prize essay by Dr. John Bell, of New York, upon the 
effects of alcoholic liquors in tubercular disease, or in constitutions predisposed 
to such disease : — 

" The opinion, so largely prevailing, as to the effects of the use of alcoholic 
liquors, viz., that they have a marked influence in preventing the deposition of 
tubercle, is destitute of any solid foundation. 

" On the contrary, their use predisposes to tubercular deposition. Where 
tubercle already exists, alcohol has no effect in modifying the usual course run 
by that substance. 

" Neither does it mitigate the morbid effects of tubercle upon the system 
in any stage of the disease." 

I believe that that is all that I have to offer upon the subject of stimulation. 

There was testimony given here the other day to the effect that the drink- 
ing usages of society were not to be deplored. Prof. Wood, of Philadelphia, 
in the United States Dispensatory, says that " the habitual use of alcoholic 
drinks produced deplorable consequences." Prof. Carpenter, in the standard 
work of Harvard College, on Physiology, says, — 

" The physiological objection to the habitual use of even small quantities 
of alcoholic drinks, rests upon the following grounds : They are universally 
admitted to possess a poisonous character. They tend to produce a morbid 
condition of the body at large. The capacity for enduring the extremes of 
heat and cold, or mental or bodily labor, is diminished, rather than increased 
by their habitual employment." 

Prof. Jacob Bigelow, in 1825, used these words : 

" Alcohol is highly stimulating, heating, and intoxicating, and its effects are 
so fascinating that when once experienced, the danger is that the desire for 
them may be perpetuated, and many patients have become gradually and 
imperceptibly intemperate under the sanction and guidance of a physician." 

Forty-two years afterwards, a son of Prof. Jacob Bigelow, and a professor 
in the same College, says, " In regard to the drinking practices of society, I do 
not think they are to be deplored." 

I think that the influence of Dr. Jacob Bigelow's words has saved many 
and many a drunkard. I was then a young man, just commencing my studies, 
and hearing that testimony from a gentleman I so highly esteemed and respec- 
ted, I resolved that I would never be guilty of making a man a drunkard, or 
lead him imperceptibly and gradually to intemperance. From that day to this, 
I not only have not used it myself, but I have never prescribed to a single 
patient any alcoholic liquors, in any form, except as I have indicated, — 
in a low state of disease, when it was necessary, temporarily, to whip up 
nature as you whip up a horse. I have seen those words verified in 
hundreds and hundreds of cases, where men have been and are now being led 
imperceptibly and gradually down towards intemperance. I meet such cases 
almost every week of my life. 

Q. Referring to your statement of the change of views of the medical 
profession upon this subject, do you recollect what Dr. Holmes once said in 
regard to the value of alcohol and other drugs ? 

A. I remember his words quite well, and think that I can repeat them. 
He said : " Throw out wine and throw out opium, and if all the rest of the 



APPENDIX. 785 

drugs were sunk into the bottom -of the ocean, it would be all the better for 
mankind and all the worse for the fishes." 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) To what school of medicine do you belong ? 

A. I graduated at Harvard College. 

Q. To what school of medicine do you now belong ? 

A . I practice Homeoepathy. 

Q. Are the extracts that you have read extracts that you have made 
yourself from the books ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. All of them ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What particular office, then, did the medical student to whom you have 
just referred, perform ? 

A. He referred me to them. 

Q. He did not make the extracts ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you Dr. Carpenter's book ? 

A. I have, at home. 

Q. Are you not aware that Dr. Carpenter himself, in his book upon physi- 
ology, in the classification of food, puts alcohol into thesame category with 
sugar and starch ? 

A. I am not ; if he does, I can prove that he is wrong. . 

Q. You have quoted to show that these medical gentlemen connected with 
Harvard College entertained some new or recent opinion ? 

A. No, sir, I only meant to give an illustration of Dr. Holmes's opinion, 
and to show that their opinion was subject to the pressure of the influence of 
the community. • , 

Q. Then what you mean to say is that those gentlemen who came here, 
and on their professional honor, did so under the supposed pressure of some 
outside pressure, and not as honorable men ? 

A. I state no inference, but just read the testimony. 

Q. Then why did you make the remark ? 

A. What remark ? 

Q. In reference to the influence of society and public opinion ? 

A. I read to you the testimony in order to explain the extraordinary fact 
that while the books of the professors teach one thing, the professors them- 
selves teach another. 

Q. Let us, then, see what the books teach. Does not Dr. Carpenter him- 
self say that there are conditions of the human system in which the occasional, 
or even habitual, use of alcoholic liquors may be beneficial and necessary ? 
A. It may be that it is so. 

Q. Then all the books do not teach the doctrine that you have laid down, 
and it is necessary for you to modify that remark as applied to Dr. Car- 
penter ? 
A. I have no objection to that. 

Q. What does Liebig, the father of modern medical chemistry, teach upon 
that subject ? 

A. I would like to prove, from Liebig himself, that it could not be true. 
99 



786 APPENDIX. 

Q. What does Liebig teach ? The argument that you make is, that those 
professors came here and testified to something that contradicts the teachings 
of all the books. Does not Liebig divide food into two general categories, — 
first, the plastic food, like those containing fibrine and casine on the one 
hand, and the respiratory food, which include sugar, starch and alcohol upon 
the other ; is not that what Liebig teaches, no matter whether it be right or 
wrong ? 

A. I am not aware that he does. If he does, I can show Liebig, or any 
other man, that alcohol is not among that class, nor can it be put into that 
system in any possible way. 

Q. You have given your opinion, and I am trying to see if you are correct 
in saying that those gentlemen contradict the books. Do you not know that 
if Liebig is famous for anything in the world, it is for having made just that a 
classification of food, and becoming the father of a school of thought upon 
that subject? 

A. I do. 

Q. Do you not know that Prof. Johnston, in his familiar lectures upon chemis- 
try, teaches the same thing, and classes alcohol as a food ? 

A . 1 could not state to the contrary, but I do not think that he is in the 
catalogue to which I referred, as being authority. I have endeavored to get 
out of their catalogue all that I could. 

Q. Are you not aware that perhaps the most eminent man in this country, 
in the department of human physiology is Dr. John C. Dalton of New York, 
and do you not know that he teaches the same thing ?* 

A. It was not to his books I referred. 

Q. Are you not aware that he is one of the most brilliant physiologists in 
this country ? 

A. I am aware that he is a brilliant physiologist. 

Q. Do you not know, also, that Dr. Brinton and Professor Lewes of Eng- 
land have taught the same thing ? 

A. Perhaps they have, but they are all wrong. 

Q. And that Dr. Brinton goes so far as to say that the extent to which 
total abstinence has been carried by a large class of abstainers in England, 
has been an injury to the health of a large portion of them ? 

A. It may be so, but I will prove that they are all wrong in five minutes. 

Q. No matter whether they are right or wrong. You have arraigned 
those medical gentlemen of Harvard College, who testified here, for con- 
tradicting the books. Do you know that Professor Anstie, of Westminster 
College, and Professor of Toxicology, published, in 1864, a book entitled 
Stimulants and Narcotics, in which he advocates the use of alcoholic drinks 
(upon a theory differing from that of Liebig), for the purpose of sustaining 
the human system, even in cases not of disease ? 

A. I believe that book is not upon the catalogue. 

Q. That is, not upon your catalogue ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. In what you have said about the tissues, are you not aware that you 
have been criticizing the very theory that Liebig originated ? 

A. I suppose that I have. 

* See note on page 894. 



APPENDIX. 787 

Q. Do you not know, as a medical man, that there are many cases in 
which it is necessary to retard the metamorphosis of the tissue, because it is 
one of the features of disease, and do you not know that water sometimes 
operates in the same way as alcohol, in retarding that metamorphosis ? 

A . I do not believe it, nor do I believe that alcohol is the right thing to 
use when it is necessary to retard the metamorphosis. 

Q. But you have just now planted yourself upon the ground that it is not 
right at all to retard the metamorphosis of the tissue, and now, as a medical 
man, you put yourself in the attitude of adhering to the proposition that it is 
not right in a large class of cases ? 

A. I simply asked the question whether tissues were worth preserving in 
that way. 

Q. Is it not very frequently desirable ? 

A. I have never seen an instance, in forty years' practice, where I thought 
that alcohol was necessary for that purpose. 

Q. Have you never seen a case where the retardation of the metamorpho- 
sis of the tissue was necessary ? 

A. I have seen such cases, but never thought that alcohol was the right 
thing to employ. 

Q. Then you retire from the position that metamorphosis of the tissue is 
not to be retarded ? You speak from experience, if I understand you, in 
saying that no drink into which alcohol enters is an article of food, or helps to 
sustain the constitution as food ? 

A. I do not say that, because there is a great deal of sugar in wine. If it 
is useful for food it is upon account of the sugar it contains, and not upon 
account of the alcohol. 

Q. Are you not aware that Cornal-o, an Italian nobleman, sustained himself 
for forty or fifty years upon twelve ounces of bread and fourteen ounces of 
wine per day ? 

A. I have heard of that case, but I do not know what it has to do with 
alcohol. 

Q. Have you not known cases where persons, prostrated by disease, were 
sustained, almost wholly, by strong alcoholic drinks, like brandy ? 

A. For a very short time it may be necessary, but only until something 
else could be introduced upon which the system could act. 

Q. Is it not often done for days together, by medical men ? 

A. It is never done, to my knowledge, unless sugar is added to the liquor. 

Q. I refer to cases where pure brandy or other liquor is used ? 

A. I never saw such a case, and I never knew a doctor to give brandy 
without the addition of sugar. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Liebig is pressed here in testimony in physiological 
matters ; are you not aware that the latest English and French physiologists 
have repudiated Liebig ? 

A . They repudiate some things in Liebig. 

Q. Do they not repudiate his doctrine that alcohol is food ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



788 APPENDIX. 



TWENTY-SECOND DAY. 

Thursday, March 28, 1867. 
The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony on 
behalf of the Remonstrants was resumed. 

. Testimony of Julius A. Palmer. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How long have you been in business in Boston ? 

A. Forty-three years. 

Q. Have you been interested in the temperance cause ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I believe I joined the first teetotal society which was organized 
here, thirty-six years ago. 

Q. During that time have your opportunities given you any knowledge as 
to the evils of intemperance and the means resorted to for suppressing them ? 

A. I became early associated with societies for relieving the poor, distrib- 
uting the bounties of such societies. I have also been for several years 
Overseer of the Poor ; and in the Primary School Committee ; and a Director 
in the House of Industry some years ; and a Visitor in the Lunatic Hospital ■ 
and a member of the city government, and have represented the city three or 
four years in the Legislature. And I have by these connections been brought 
very much in contact with the lower classes of society and have noticed the 
causes of their poverty and suffering and crime. I will say, sir, that in the 
city Lunatic Hospital I rarely ever saw a temperate patient. I never expected 
to find an inmate there who was not indulgent in the use of intoxicating 
drinks. And in the House of Industry the rule was that the parties brought 
their poverty and other distress upon them by intemperate habits. 

Since the passage of the prohibitory law I have been connected with 
various associations. We have made efforts to get the City Government to 
enforce that law. We have memorialized the City Government, and I have 
copies here of resolutions which were adopted at a large meeting of the 
citizens, and signed by a very large and respectable committee of such men 
as Dr. Gannett, Lyman Beecher, Rev. Dr. Streeter, Rev, Dr. Miner, Rev. 
Baron Stow, and a large number of prominent merchants. The date of this is 
June 20th, 1853. Here is a copy also of an address to the citizens in behalf 
of the execution of the Massachusetts prohibitory law, which bears similar 
names, and also a memorial to the City Government— -the Mayor and Alder- 
men — in favor of enforcing the law. And I have here also the published 
accounts of several meetings held on different occasions with reference to 
putting the means of intemperance out of the way. One of these meetings 
was addressed by Rev. Mr. Burton, minister at large, in which he stated from 
his own observation that intemperance was fearfully on the increase. The 
date of this was 1846. Among these names are the names of Dr. Channing 
and Dr. Tuckerman. I very well remember the occasion and a number of 
those who were present at the time. The house was packed, and the agents 
of the several societies for the relief of the poor were there. The date 



APPENDIX. 789 

is Monday evening. This is from the "Courier" of December 18th, 1853. 
Rev. Dr. Waterston made a very stirring speech, setting forth the evils of 
intemperance. Hon. John C. Park also made an address, and the addresses 
were all in one strain, showing that, intemperance was greatly on the increase, 
and calling on our public authorities to enforce the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What do your facts show you relative to the time 
that the reformation seemed to culminate here in Boston ? 

A. Well, sir, according to my recollection, and I have refreshed my 
memory from statistics here, the cause was going on under the principle of 
moral suasion until the Washingtonian movement commenced in 1841. I 
think it was then rather taken out of the hands of the religious community. 
There seemed to be a great desire to hear reformed inebriates at the public 
meetings, and the addresses fell very much into that line, and the cause went by 
default into the hands of Washingtonian s, and it ran for some three years under 
their auspices, until it came to be the fact that then our public meetings were 
talked to by reformed inebriates, and the interest of the cause subsided in 
the churches and Sabbath school classes. Then there came, in 1844 or 1845, 
a reaction. The interest in the Washingtonian movement had run out, in a 
measure, and the good men who had been engaged in the cause had got hold 
of other things, and I think that from 1846 to 1851 intemperance was very 
much increased. I have here a report made by the Chief of Police to the 
city government, I think, about that date. There was a movement about this 
time in the city government, and the City Marshal was ordered to report the 
whole number of places where liquor was sold, and the classification of them, 
and how many kept open on the Sabbath, and he returned fifteen hundred 
places in 1851. The population of the city, if I remember aright, was about 
one hundred and twenty thousand at that time. 

Of these places, 490 were kept by Americans, 100 by Germans, English and 
Swedes, and 900 by Irish. There were in cellars 310, and 1,190 above ground. 
There were kept by males 1,374, and 126 by females, and there were 979 
kept open on the Sabbath. This report was signed by the City Marshal. 

Q. (By Mr. Spoqner.) I would like your opinion as to the disposition 
of the city government of Boston in regard to the enforcement of the law ? 

A, There has never been any disposition on the part of the city government 
so far as my knowledge extends, to have the law enforced. On the contrary, 
they have taken measures, from time to time, to prevent its enforcement. 

Q. Can you mention any particular cases ? 

A. I happen to have here a city document for the year 1855, being a pre- 
amble and resolutions in relation to the enforcement of the liquor law, and I 
remember the circumstances. Dr. Smith had just been elected, and the tem- 
perance vote had been thrown in his favor, and he promised to enforce the 
law. There was a fear that he would do so, and it was desired, on the part 
of some, to head him off, and it was done in this manner : After he had issued 
his instructions to the police, this resolution was brought forward : — 

Whereas, a certain proclamation purporting to emanate from the Mayor of 
the City of Boston, has lately appeared ; and whereas the said Mayor of Boston 
is an officer of the City of Boston, and that no Ordinance has been passed by 



790 APPENDIX. 

the Common Council of Boston, conferring upon the said Mayor and the 
Board of Aldermen or either of them any authority to employ the City 
Funds or the City Officers, superior or inferior, in the execution of the Act, 
entitled, " An Act concerning the Manufacture and Sale of Spirituous 
Liquors," passed April 20, 1855 ; and whereas, in no shape or way whatever 
have any of the Chartered rights and powers of the City of Boston been 
delegated to the Mayor and Board of Aldermen or either of them, by the 
City of Boston on account of, or in aid of the said Act; and whereas it is 
proper and just that the Chartered rights of the City should be protected from 
infringement or usurpation from any source ; 

Therefore be it Resolved, That the powers conferred by the Act entitled 
" An Act concerning the Manufacture and Sale of Spirituous Liquors " on 
the Mayor and Board of Aldermen of this City constitute them in that 
respect Slate officers, as distinct from their Municipal powers derived from 
their election under the City Charter. 

Resolved, That all officers of the City Government be expressly prohibited 
from employing or using any property of this Corporation, or any money in 
its Treasury, or the credit of this Corporation, for the purpose of enforcing or 
executing " An Act concerning the Manufacture and Sale of Spirituous 
Liquors ; " and that if any officer under salary from this Corporation shall 
devote any portion of his time to the execution of said Act of the Common- 
wealth of Massachusetts, he shall on oath report to the accounting officers the 
amount of time so expended, and a proportionable amount of money shall be 
discounted and reserved from the salary allowed from this Corporation. And 
if any officer of this Corporation shall falsely return the amount of time so 
expended, he ought to be dismissed from the service of this Corporation ; and 
no money of this City shall ever afterwards be applied to paying such persons 
any salary or compensation whatever. 

And be it further Resolved, That this Corporation in no way authorizes or 
empowers its officers to do any acts for or on account of the execution of 
" An Act concerning the Manufacture and Sale of Spirituous Liquors," but 
leaves all persons to derive from said Act their authority, compensation and 
indemnity, without this Corporation in any way conferring or delegating the 
powers on them conferred by their Charter, in support of this said Act. And 
that any action of the Mayor and Board of Aldermen of the City of Boston 
in the execution of said Act is and shall be regarded and understood as 
altogether independent of, and without the sanction of the City of Boston in 
their corporative capacity. 

At that time it was feared that there might be a majority among the Board 
of Aldermen in favor of the law. This document is found among the docu- 
ments of that time, and is in keeping with the action of the City Government 
of Boston for those years and for several years afterwards, and even at the 
present time. Perhaps it may throw some light on the question which you 
ask as to the disposition of the City Government, if I state a fact which 
comes to my memory now, which is that after the passage of the prohibitory 
law, and before it went into execution, which, if I remember aright, was in 
1852, Mayor Seaver issued between four and five hundred (I think it was four 
hundred and sixty-three) licenses to rumsellers for a year. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) That was in 1852 ? 

A. That was in 1852. 

Q. While the bill was pending ? 

A. I think it was in the month of June, and the law went into operation 
on the first of July. I remember there was a hard scrabble around the City 
Hall to get people to come up and take licenses so that the sale should not be 
restrained. 



APPENDIX. 791 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) In regard to people keeping first-class hotels 
without selling liquor, what is your judgment? 

A. Well, sir, I think that keeping a rum-shop in a hotel is an incongruous 
affajr. It is not necessary to have our first-class hotels keep a liquor shop, 
any more than it is that they should keep a meat shop. I have had occasion 
to notice, in my travels abroad, that the hotels did not keep open bars, and I 
think that a large portion of the travelling public who come to the city of 
Boston would be better pleased and accommodated to go into hotels where 
there is not one of those places. With regard to furnishing liquors to be served 
at the tables, that is a matter of more difficulty. If it was a matter for me 
to determine, I should not complain very much as to that ; but this keeping 
bars in the basement of hotels, where Harvard students and other young men 
can go and get their liquor, and are tempted to go, is a very bad thing. 

Q. Would it be difficult to separate the two ? 

A. I suppose there would be some ingenuity by which the liquor would be 
sold. 

Q. But if the law was enforced and no hotels sold liquor, of course persons 
would supply themselves ? 

A . I think that a large portion of the business men travelling from the 
West and South, merchants coming from the West, especially, often want to 
bring their wives with them, and they object because there is so much 
carousing in the rum part of the establishment. 

Q. Do you think that intemperance has increased in the city ? 

A. Well, sir, we judge such things very much according to the stand- 
point we take. I would say that for the last five years my residence has 
been in the country. Although I come into the city every day I think I do 
not circulate among the people as much as I used to. But I have not seen 
for the last eight or ten years and have not come in contact with nearly as 
much intemperance as I used to. I suppose that there never was a time 
when if men were disposed to go among people of the lower classes of society 
and see how they were living in this matter they would think that intem- 
perance was increasing. It depends very much on where we go. I suppose 
that I could take almost any clergyman to portions of the city where he would 
be surprised at the condition of the people. He would be led to think there 
never was such a time for hard drinking as at present, because he had never 
seen it before. I used to hear this remarked in 1835, and in 1842 and in 1850, 
and I saw it a great deal worse then than I have recently ; but my judgment, 
from my own observation, would not be that intemperance is on the increase 
in the city. I will suggest a reason for the opinion that it is on the increase 
which I have not heard suggested. I have not attended any of these 
hearings, but I have observed in going over the railroads that it is the 
practice of some young men and of some older men, if they want to 
have a good time, to come to Boston. The liquor law, being enforced in 
the country towns, drives people in here, and when they get here they have 
opportunities for getting liquors without any hindrance. I recollect when 
they used to go out fishing and stretched out their seine, that when they 
began to draw in, the waters would all be smooth; but after a time 
you would see a fin here and there, and before they got the seine nearly 



792 APPENDIX. 

drawn in there would be quite a fluttering ; and it seems to me that the tem- 
perance seine is being drawn down here to Boston, and we have seen the fins 
fluttering a good deal lately. 

Q. As between the prohibitory law and a license law what is your judg- 
ment? 

A. Well, sir, I am not in favor of a license law, because the past license 
laws, according to my observation and knowledge have been failures. I do 
not think that they have done any good. Sometimes when they have been 
first enacted there have been clauses in them that were pretty favorable for 
the cause of temperance, but they have most always been stricken out pretty 
soon. Like the present excise law in New York there has already been a new 
bill introduced for the purpose of changing it and giving more freedom to 
sellers. This is the case now in New York, and that has been my observation 
in regard to past license laws generally. Whenever they have had clauses 
in them which restricted the sale of liquor, unfortunately for the trade, and 
so as to promote the cause of temperance, these clauses have very soon been 
stricken out by the Legislatures. 

Q. But did they enforce such clauses ? 

A. I was just going to speak of that. I have never known a license law 
to operate to the restriction of the sale to any great extent. It is a general 
license to sell, under any license law that we have ever had. 

Q. They licensed enough so that there was no inconvenience to any person 
to get liquor, I suppose ? 

A. I object to a license, law because it has a tendency to make a trade 
respectable which is abominable ; and I see no necessity for a license law, 
because provision can be made for the legitimate sale of liquor without one ; 
and I think a licensed place, if the sale was restricted to licensed places for 
the general sale of intoxicating drinks, is a nuisance in any place. Then, in 
reference to the prohibitory law, and why I would not have it repealed, I 
would say, in the first place, that I think that where it has been enforced it 
has prevented, to a great extent, the evils which result from intemperance. 
I think it is a great deal better to enforce it than it would be to repeal it, and 
I think it will, if permitted to remain, be ultimately enforced. When the 
Hon. Mr. Samuel A. Eliot, who was very much opposed to the prohibitory 
law, was called to testify before a committee of the Legislature, and was asked 
whether the prohibitory law could be enforced, he answered, with some indig- 
nation, " Yes, sir ; though it should take all the bayonets in the Commonwealth 
to do it." I should object to the alteration of the law because it has been 
nullified by government officers, influential citizens and liquor-dealers, and I 
think that the Commonwealth owes it to its dignity to carry it out until the 
people submit to it. If a law which has been upon the statute book for fifteen 
years, and decided to be constitutionally right, is to be nullified in Massachu- 
setts, we are certainly no better off than they were in South Carolina in 1832. 
But I will here allude to the first temperance convention held in the city after 
this law was enacted in 1852. I think it was in the month of November. 
There was a very large convention of delegates from all parts of the State. 
It was held in the Melodeon in the daytime, and in the evening Music Hall 
was packed ; and the spirit of that convention was to put down nullification, 



APPENDIX. 793 

and then to put down the liquor traffic. The resolutions and speeches were 
to that effect, and they were sustained by the general sentiment of the con- 
vention. I think, sir, that this spirit of nullification in the city of Boston is 
the great secret why the citizens of Massachusetts have stood by this law 
for fifteen years without flinching and with the determination not to alter a 
letter or a comma so as to make it less objectionable to liquor-sellers. And 
when government officials, liquor-sellers, and many of our principal citizens 
set themselves about nullifying the law, I think that the great mass of the 
people will stand by it until all is blue. 

Q. You think it is the spirit of the people to carry out this law ? 

A. Yes, sir ; almost universally. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you know of any instances in which there 
has been such a legislation in Massachusetts as you speak of? 

A. Well, sir, I am not positive on that point. 

Q. Do you know of any instance in which any stringent provision which 
has been enacted on this subject has been altered in any way except to make 
it more stringent ? 

A. My impression has been that it has never been necessary in Massa- 
chusetts. 

Q. Then that does not apply to Massachusetts ? 

A . I referred more particularly to New York. 

Q. In the history of legislation has there ever been any instance in which 
the provisions of any of the various license laws were modified to make them 
less effective ? 

A. I cannot recollect one at this moment. 

Q. Then that part of your opinion is not applicable ? 

A. That would not apply. 

Q. Do you think there is less intemperance than there has been, and that 
it has been growing less for the last fifteen years ? 

A. I said that so far as my observation extended, I had seen less of the 
evils of intemperance. 

Q. What do you believe to be the fact ? Do you believe that, for the last 
fifteen years, taking the whole period together, the amount of intemperance 
has been diminished in Boston ? 

A. Well, I do not mean to state that. I simply meant to state my own 
observation. I stated that I had lived in the country, in a temperance town, 
for the last six or eight years, or have had my local residence there, and that 
I had not been called to the city so much ; and that so far as my observation 
extended, I had seen less intemperance, and had been led to hope that it was 
really less. But when gentlemen come here, who have opportunities of know- 
ing, and state that it is greater, I am quite willing to allow that they have 
better means of knowing than I have, and that their opinion would modify 
mine. 

Q. Then you have no opinion which you would wish the Committee to 
rely upon that intemperance has diminished ? 
. A. I have no more definite opinion than I have stated. 

Q. Do you think that your opinion would justify the Committee in going 
into this matter and assuming that intemperance had not been increasing ? 
s 100 



794 APPENDIX 

A. It would not. 

Q. You spoke of the city government of Boston as not being willing and 
not trying to enforce the present law. What facts, aside from this paper, have 
you on which to found that opinion or statement which you made ? 

A. Well, sir, I think the annual addresses of all our mayors, if studied, will 
show the absence of all disposition to enforce the liquor law, and a spirit in 
favor of having the police lenient on this subject. That is one fact. 

Q. Are you aware that after this law took effect, complaints were made 
and carried into court until the courts requested the city government to 
send no more cases there ? 

A. Well, sir, I knew that such a request had been made. 

Q. Well, what could the city government do ? They had not the power 
to punish, and only to make the complaint, and what more could they have 
done than they did do ? 

A. A resolute spirit in favor of sustaining the law would have diminished 
very much the number of sellers and prevented complaints. My opinion is, 
sir, that the cases that were carried into the courts for the first few years after 
the liquor law was passed, were cases made up and carried there for litigation, 
and carried there expressly for the purpose of retarding the enforcement of 
the law. 

Q. Well, that is rather serious. Have you any facts upon which to base 
such a statement ? It is certainly an imputation on the honor and fidelity of 
the City Government. 

A. Well, sir; I was about the City Hall a great deal of the time for 
several years after the law was passed, and there was an atmosphere entirely 
uncongenial to the prohibitory law, and the violators of that law understood 
very well what the disposition was. 

Q. The imputation that you made was that in the administration of their 
official duties, they selected such cases as were to go there to be litigated with a 
view to retard the execution of the law. Now have you any other facts on 
which to base that statement, than those which you have stated ? You have 
spoken of the atmosphere of the City Hall ? 

A. Well, sir, there were often declarations in private conversation, (not so 
much in debates), and the members of the City Government were continually 
repeating the declaration that that law should not be executed. 

Q. Did you hear any of these ? 

A. Yes, sir, repeatedly ; and I recollect one instance after the inaugura- 
tion of Mayor Bigelow. He assumed in his inaugural address that the City 
Government were in favor of a license law. I do not remember the exact 
phraseology, but the expressions were true in fact, but such as he had no right 
to make, committing the whole City Government in favor of a license law 
and against a prohibitory law. An Order was made referring so much of the 
Mayor's address as related to the license law to a joint special committee in 
order to examine the facts. It brought before the Council the whole subject 
of prohibitory law or license law, and was debated two or three evenings ; 
but the Order was not carried in the Council. There was a memorial, signed 
by Stephen Fairbanks and others, asking that the City Government should 
wipe out this reproach upon the city of Boston. They brought the subject up 



APPENDIX. 795 

again, and the Order was earned in the Council, and sent to the other body, 
and laid upon the table there and never heard of afterwards. 

Q. The point on which I was asking you was that there was a want of 
good faith on the part of the City Government to enforce the law ; and that 
prosecutions were made with a view of preventing the enforcement of the law. 
Do you suppose that gentlemen, because they are opposed to the provisions of 
a law, would not enforce it when holding official positions ? 

A. I do not mean to say that. 

Q. Well, sir, have you any other facts than what you have already stated, 
that go to show that in the prosecutions by the city officers there was a want 
of good faith and a design to defeat rather than to execute the law ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think it is needful to state any other facts. 

Q. In regard to this paper that you presented, do you know whether it 
was ever passed or not ? 

A. No, sir ; but I know that it sounded natural. 

Q. Do you know that the Order passed ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you know that there was an Order passed instructing the police to 
enter prosecution against the Treraont House bar ? 

A. No, sir ; but I know that at that time there was a great fear that the 
temperance people had succeeded in electing a Mayor and Aldermen who 
would make a movement. 

Q. But as upon your recollection you cannot say ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Now, could not such a document have been introduced by a single 
member and put in print to circulate ? 

A. It is the report of a committee, sir, is it not? 

Q. As a matter of fact, it was never called up and acted upon by the city 
government. You say that it is the report of a committee ? 

Q. (By Mr. Palmer.) Does it not appear so on the first page ? 

A. (By Mr. Child.) No, sir. 

A. Then I was mistaken as to that fact. 

Q. Do you recollect another instance, under the same Mayor and Alder- 
men, that an Order was passed, unanimously or nearly so, by the Board of 
Aldermen, not to allow and pay any bills for excursions of the city government 
where liquors were used ? 

A. Yes, sir. That did not, however, pass the Board of Aldermen. 

Q. Now, then, have you any other facts that justify the imputation that 
you make, or any other statement as to this want of fidelity on the part of the 
city officials in not honestly executing the law ? 

A. No specific facts. 

Q. Or general idea ? 

A . No, sir, except the general reception that temperance people met with 
when they went to claim the sympathy and support of the city government in 
their efforts to have the law executed. 

Q. Can you conceive anything more that the city could do than com- 
mencing and sending to the courts the prosecutions which they have sent ? 



796 APPENDIX. 

Q. Well, what else could they do ? 

A . I think they ought to give the moral support of the government to the 
sustaining of the law. 

Q. What moral support can they give other than that of constant arrests 
of the offenders, and sending them to the tribunals where they are to be 
tried ? 

A. They ought to do it willingly, not grudgingly. They ought to be free 
to do it. 

Q. Were you aware that the prosecutions which were sent in by the city 
government were very numerous, and that the courts were clogged ? 

A. Yes, sir, I am aware of that, and what I mean to say is, that if the city 
government had answered the question as Mayor Eliot did, when, although 
opposed to the law, he said that it should be executed if it took all the bayo- 
nets in the Commonwealth to do it ; if they had taken that ground and had 
shown that sj>irit, the law would have been executed to a much greater extent, 
at least, than it has been so far in this city. 

Q. Is it not true to-day, that one of the great obstacles in the way of 
enforcing the present law in Boston, is in the fact that it has not the sympathy 
of a large portion of the community. I do not say whether it is a majority of 
the community or not ? 

A. I should think, sir, that one great obstacle in the way of enforcing the 
law, is that the men to whom we look for the execution of the law, are not in 
sympathy with the execution of that law. I think a great portion of the 
people of Boston, who are desirous that the law should be executed, are 
averse to taking any public action in reference to its enforcement. Most of 
our temperance people are of that class who would rather go to church and 
prayer-meetings than to police courts. 

Q. And that class of people do not make any active public movement in 
relation to it ? 

A. No, sir, not actively. 

Q. Is not that one of the great sources of the want of efficiency in regard 
to this law ? 

A. That is a matter of opinion. 

Q. Is it not your opinion ? 

A. No, sir ; I think that if the people would act upon it strongly, it would 
bring about a better state of public sentiment. 

Q. Now, in reference to dram-shops and hotels, would it be a better state 
of things, for the cause of temperance and for the morals of the young men 
of Boston, if the public bars should be closed and kept closed, and if there 
should be really no liquor sold by the glass, though public houses furnished to 
their guests, with their meals, as much liquor as they might call for ? Would 
it be a better state of things than at present ? 

A. Yes, sir ; certainly it would. 

Q. Would it not be a great difference in Boston from anything we have 
ever had ? 

A. Yes, sir; the public bars are now the greatest nuisance we have 
here, and if they should be abolished it would be so much clear gain. 



APPENDIX. 797 

Q. Then, if this should be enforced, so far as Boston is concerned, would it 
not be a gain ? I assume that it should be carried out. Would it not be a 
gain over anything we have yet had ? 

A. A great gain, if it could be done. 

Q. Would it be more so, excluding the public bars and having the hotels 
to sell to their guests ? Could such a law be more easily enforced than the 
present prohibitory law ? 

A . I think it could be more easily enforced in the hotels. 

Q. Then in regard to other drinking places, except in connection with the 
hotels in Boston ; if they were all closed, and kept closed, so that there was 
no drinking in houses or shops or bars, would not that be a very great 
advance from anything we have ever had ? 

A. Very great. 

Q. And if that could be done, it would be an improvement upon the pres- 
ent state of things, in your opinion ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Mr. Child has asked you whether it would not 
be an improvement on the present state of things if you should shut up the 
public bars and only give liquor to the guests of hotels ; but would it not be 
better still if the law should be enforced right straight through ? 

A. In the first place, I have no faith that the first thing could be done. 
I think the evil is inseparable in the two cases. 

Q. Speaking about the efforts of the city to enforce the law, could they 
not have used the seizure clause just as well as Major Jones ? 

A . I know nothing why they could not. 

Q. Do you think that three hundred cases in one year, two hundred and 
eighty the next, and two hundred and fifty-one the next, show any disposition 
to enforce the law ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) If they made as many prosecutions as the court 
could try, sitting every day in the year, could they do any more ? 

A. The gentlemen can judge as well as myself. 

• 

Testimony of H. R. Storer, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You are a resident of Boston ? , 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you been connected with any medical board of instruction ? 

A. For three years I was an instructor in the Harvard School ? 

Q. Your present relations are as Professor in the Berkshire Medical 
College ? 

A. I am Professor in the Berkshire Medical College. 

Q. We would be glad to have you make such observations as your oppor- 
tunities for observing may justify you in making in regard to the use of intox- 
icating liquors and their effects upon the human system ? 

A . Well, sir, you ask two or three questions of me at once, and each is a 
question upon which medical men very greatly differ among themselves. 
Formerly it was the custom of physicians very largely to prescribe alcohol, 
and, like the rest of the community, to consume alcohol freely themselves. 



798 APPENDIX. 

Now-a-days it is not so much the custom. With reference to its effects upon 
persons in health, my own impression is, that it is in a great many instances, 
at any rate, and even in moderate amounts, decidedly injurious. 

Q. Take persons in average health, what would be your opinion, speaking 
in general terms, of the utility of alcoholic beverages ? 

A. Certainly that they would be unnecessary. 

Q. Would you anticipate deleterious influences if daily used, and in such 
quantities as they are usually consumed by men who are called habitual, if 
not intemperate drinkers ? 

A. We very constantly see evil effects which can be attributed to no other 
source ; perhaps not showing themselves at all until after some years, but 
concerning whose causation there can be no doubt. 

Q. Is it true that some persons in whom alcoholic diseases exist are cut off 
by other diseases, preventing the alcoholic influences from fully showing 
themselves? 

A. When a man has in any way become affected by these diseases, of 
course he is more prone to feel the effect of any acute attack whatever. 

Q. Are cases which might properly enough be attributed to the use of 
alcohol, cases where death is reported to have ensued from other diseases ? 

A. Every physician who has examined the records must recognize the fact 
that the returns made by physicians are generally made with reference to the 
primary cause which killed the patient. The physician is not required to go 
into the patient's general state and habits of life. 

Q. Is it a fact that acute diseases often determine the limit of life in case 
of a weakened condition of the system through the influence of alcohol, when 
the patient might have resisted but for that weakened condition ? 

A. I have no doubt of that at all. 

Q. So that the statistics on such points, however carefully kept, would not 
show the probable amount of mortality from this cause ? 

A. It is said that statistics may be made to prove both sides of any ques- 
tion. We all know that they are collected from different sources, with differ- 
ent results, and from very different stand-points, and under entirely different 
surroundings. • 

Q. Is it not true that in the case of persons who have used moderately or 
habitually intoxicating beverages, even the lighter beverages, except where 
the symptoms are chronic and amount to disease, which are believed and 
confessed to be attributable to the long influences of alcohol — is it not true 
that the abandonment of these beverages, even after these symptoms appear, 
brings restoration ? 

A. That is undoubtedly true in many cases; but oftentimes the sudden 
breaking off creates a certain amount of disturbance. 

Q. Is that believed to be as dangerous as the continuance of the habit ? 

A. In many cases not, sir; and in other cases these influences can be 
counteracted. 

Q. You have been conversant with the work of Dr. Day ? 

A. I have been conversant with his labors to some extent. And I regret 
that his modesty should have prevented him from stating yesterday the fact 
of having been appointed to the superintendence of the larger establishment 
at Binghamton, New York. 



APPENDIX. 799 

Q. You have observed the late publication by Dr. Day, entitled Mytho- 
mania, treating of diseases resulting from intemperance? 

A. That is rather a home thrust, as at Dr. Day's solicitation I added an 
appendix to that work. 

Q. You made some remarks on the influence of alcohol upon the vital 
powers, and upon the quality of the progeny of parents who used alcoholic 
beverages ? 

A. I did, sir. 

Q. Will you be kind enough to state briefly your view on that point ? 

A. I remarked the fact (for I recognize it as a fact, and received as 
such by the best of the profession), that bad habits of different kinds, that 
indulgences in vices of different kinds, tend at once to deteriorate the constitu- 
tion of the parent, and thereby to affect the offspring, and at the same time 
to establish a tendency to that very vice and that very indulgence in the 
child. 

Q. In relation to this subject, do you mean to say that it deteriorates the 
vigor and the constitution of the child, and not of the child only, but that it 
also tends to lessen the number of children. 

A. The lessening of the number of children is at present a problem that 
is exciting a great deal of attention. I think it would be better to refer you 
to the newspapers of the day. 

Q. Do you regard it as the chief cause ? 

A. Certainly not the only one. 

Q. Have you given considerable attention, more than usual attention, to 
the subject of decrease of population and hereditary descent ? If I remem- 
ber right you read a paper before the American Medical Association on that 
subject V 

A. I did, sir. 

Q. In relation to the controversy which has been raging for the last 
quarter of a century among scientific men, as to the question whether or not 
alcohol is in any sense food, what value do you attach to that question, even 
if it be decided affirmatively ? That is, if Liebig be sustained, what value 
has that as bearing upon the testimony before this Committee ? 

A. The question is a very important one in a scientific point of view. 
Like all questions in organic chemistry, it is one which is extremely difficult 
to settle ; and like all questions in scientific chemistry, it is more than others 
yet unsettled. 

Q. But if decided affirmatively, would you regard it as having great im- 
portance practically as regards the objects of inquiry before this Committee ? 

A. I should suppose it would be of about as much importance as the 
scientific question (which would probably be decided in the affirmative,) 
whether the use of arsenic, as it is employed by the peasants in Styria, under 
certain circumstances and in certain quantities, is not only not productive of any 
immediate injury, but makes a person to appear to be in a better condition 
of health. It is stated that arsenic can be taken for a long period of time, 
and in enormous doses with apparent benefit to the health. But I suppose 
it would hardly be considered proper to introduce the general use of it 
among our own population. 



800 APPENDIX. 

Q. But you would not grant an affirmative judgment on this question ? 
You would not think of ranging arsenic among the articles of food ? 

A . I should not. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You spoke of the statistics not being very reliable. 
I agree with you entirely. Do you include that class of statistics in which 
scientific gentlemen have made examinations and records of a great variety of 
cases during a period of years, and then from these actual examinations have 
drawn their conclusions and given the statistics from which they were derived. 
You do not include those, do you ? 

A. I certainly do. And I would compare the case to that of the analysis 
of ores, at the present time where this will be found to be true. You might 
take certain specimens and submit them to different chemists, and put them 
upon their oath, and they will give you entirely different results. 

Q. Then these are not reliable ? 

A. They are not absolutely reliable. 

Q. As to the State assaying or anything else ? 

A, I make no exception, sir. 

Q. You spoke of the number of children being less, owing to this influence. 
Have you noticed the fact that the number of births among the foreign popu- 
lation is greater than that among the native population ? 

A. So far as I am aware, I was the first man to point out that fact. 

Q. That is a fact ? I 

A . I have no doubt at all of it. 

Q. That the number of births among the foreign population in this country 
is much greater, in proportion to the population, than that among the American 
population ? 

A. There is no doubt of it. 

Q. Is it not a fact that among the foreign population there is more 
intemperance ? 

A. I have no doubt of it. 

Q. Notwithstanding ? 

A. If you will allow me, I will give an explanation, perhaps satisfactory 
The Catholic Church makes it penal for her people, either before or after 
birth, to destroy their children, while our own churches do not. And that is a 
fact which affords sufficient explanation. 

Q. Are there other causes which influence the number and health of the 
children ? 

A. I said that intemperance is considered but one of the causes. 

Q. Is it the most important, or least important, or half way ? 

A . It is quite an important cause. 

Q. Does the use of opium and things of that kind have the same tendency ? 

A. I think not, sir. They may, perhaps, have a certain tendency in that 
direction, but they certainly do not affect the system in the same extreme. 

Q. You speak of the deleterious character and effect of stimulants admin- 
istered by phyiscians, etc. The scientific and medical faculty are divided in 
opinion, are they not ? 

A. They are, sir. 



APPENDIX. 801 

Q. If the Legislature desired a fact on which to base a criminal law, is 
there a sufficiently united opinion on that point to make it safe to take it as a 
settled fact preparatory to making a law ? 

A. I should think the mere question as to whether alcohol was an article 
of food, or whether it acted in one way or another, was too incidental to affect 
the decision. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) You speak of alcohol as a medicine. Do you think 
the results sought by the use of liquor in pulmonary diseases can be gained as 
well by any other medicine ? 

A. That is a very difficult question to answer. The cure of pulmonary 
disease is a point not as yet obtained. We are empirical in treating that 
class of diseases. We try one thing, and then another; and we may lengthen 
life by some agents, but not absolutely save it. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Is it not common to prescribe alcoholic preparations 
or the sake of the fusel oil which is contained, for instance, in whiskey ? 

A. Certainly, but the effect is a pharmaceutical question, which I have 
not investigated. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have you any other statement which you desire to 
make? 

A. I have only a word to add. I think that altogether too much impor- 
tance is laid on this medical question as to the exact end or result of the 
introduction of alcohol into the human economy. As you have seen, medical 
men differ among themselves. Reliable observers state as the result of their 
observation, that while alcohol may perhaps be of use and may fulfil certain 
indications ; still that it does not necessarily follow that that is constantly the 
case, nor could it fulfil any end not otherwise obtainable, if it were so. In a 
conversation which I had last evening with Professor Lombard, of Harvard 
College — a gentleman of considerable standing in proportion to his years — he 
stated that in his estimation (he having given special attention to this matter 
of chemical physiology), the question is entirely unsettled. And that Prof. 
Lombard's statement might weigh more, I have brought a copy of a paper 
which he published in the " New York Medical Journal " for June, 1865, on 
the influence of alcohol on the animal temperature. Prof. Lombard takes the 
ground that alcohol does raise the animal temperature. He states as follows : 

*' I am well aware that the advocates of total abstinence have tried desper- 
ately to prove that even small quantities of alcohol lessen the power of 
resisting a reduced temperature. But the proofs to the contrary are just as 
numerous and as weighty. 

" This article must not, however, be construed as a defence of the habitual 
use of intoxicating liquors, which is the usual lot of such articles. On the 
contrary, I am far from advocating any such anti-temperance doctrine, but at 
the same time consider it equally unreasonable to indulge in a fanatical 
crusade against the use of alcohol in all forms and on all occasions, as Dr. 
Carpenter, Professor Miller and others have done." 

Now, as I understand it, the position of the medical profession at large is 

that, under certain circumstances and in some forms, alcohol may be of 

advantage. But I do protest against such opinions being advanced as that 

people can prescribe it for themselves whenever they choose. I will refer to 

101 



802 APPENDIX. 

another matter, which is incidental to the main question, and will read from a 
paper, the more interesting in this connection from the fact that it is prefaced 
by a strong endorsement by Governor Andrew. It is a report by the State 
Commission on Insanity, of 1863 and 1864, of which I had the honor of being 
a member. This report shows by reasoning which has not and never can be 
answered, that it was for the interest of the Commonwealth to cure insanity 
wherever it could cure it, and prevent it wherever it could prevent it. And 
I contend that the arguments there used apply precisely, and word for word, 
to the case of inebriates, whether they are habitual drinkers or whether they 
are confirmed drunkards. This is Senate Document 72 of the session of 1864. 
The report presents statements which prove conclusively the pecuniary worth 
of each individual as a laborer to the community. 

With regard to the manner in which alcohol is used by physicians, they 
differ. It was formerly used constantly ; now it is used less. It is now the 
common practice to use aqueous extracts, and so to avoid the use of alcohol. 
My own practice is no exception to this rule. Dr. James Jackson is very 
much respected by me ; but it must be remembered that in his time it was the 
custom to treat disease, to a great extent, by prescribing alcoholic tinctures, 
and it is possible that his statement may have been, to a certain extent, owing 
to the acknowledged forgetfulness of old age. Formerly it was considered 
always necessary, when a woman was confined, to administer some alcoholic 
preparation after the labor was completed ; and it was always customary to 
give the physician his dram, too. It was formerly considered necessary after 
surgical operations to administer alcoholic stimulants. That custom is lapsing. 
As an instance in proof of this assertion, I may mention that, only last week, 
the " Philadelphia Medical and Surgical Reporter " gave an article from the 
present Superintendent of the Naval Hospital at Chelsea, Dr. Coues, in 
which it is stated distinctly with reference to this point, that ordinary food is 
infinitely better after such operations, and in many forms of disease, than the 
special food which we are now discussing. My own belief is, that the ques- 
tion before you, gentlemen, to decide, is a question, not whether we are to 
permit a certain branch of trade to prosper, not whether we are to afford 
facilities for gentlemen to dilute our Cochituate, when they come from the 
West where the water requires enforcement, not whether we are to prevent 
men from a slow process of suicide, but to protect ourselves. And any man 
who has made any extended examination of our almshouses, as it has been my 
own unpleasant duty to do, who has looked into the causes of insanity, who has 
visited among the poor, and heard the complaints of widows and orphans, and 
frequently the agonizing expression of the drunkard himself (no matter if 
even he be but a moderate drinker) , must see the necessity for some remedy 
for this evil. I myself am not a total abstainer. I do sometimes take a glass 
of wine with a friend. I do not approve of it. But we are all mortal. I 
think, however, that there is no one who would not desire that the present 
law should have a fair trial, and who would not believe that the law could be 
enforced even in Boston. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You speak, sir, of the opinions and facts in regard 
to these matters being so exceedingly unsettled that they are not in a condi- 
tion to be made the basis of legislation ? 



APPENDIX. 803 

• 

A. I think that in many respects they are. 

Q. As a whole ? 

A. As regards this very point that you referred to a short time ago, I 
myself have the belief that there are points upon which the Legislature cannot 
have much occasion to base there action. 

Q. The idea that I meant was, that whenever you are to establish and 
make a basis of legislation upon certain facts and usages, to prohibit any par- 
ticular custom by criminal prosecution, is the opinion of medical gentlemen to 
bear uniformly ? Would you consider these opinions strong enough in these 
respects to make the non-observance of the law a sin, and send the man who 
does not observe it to the House of Correction ? 

A. In these matters, medical men have partially taken their position from 
their understanding of the law. Now, as I understand it, the law formerly 
considered a man who committed a crime under the influence of liquor as 
blameworthy on the ground that he was voluntarius demon, and punished him 
more severely. Now-a-days, if a man commit that crime under the influence 
of liquor, his counsel endeavors that this shall be considered as an excuse, and 
that the man's crime shall be treated more leniently, whereas if he has drank 
so much as to have the delirium tremens, it is thought that Almighty God has 
so severely dealt with him that human law ought not to interfere. I think the 
medical profession take their views partly from these doctrines. I think many 
of the questions which are dwelt upon here are side issues, which go to 
strengthen the views of the people of the State. These side issues should not 
be considered fit to outweigh others that they serve undoubtedly to show the 
skill and eloquence (certainly yesterday) of counsel ; but that they serve only 
to throw dust in the eyes. 

Q. You say that the present law is not enforced ? 

A. The present law seems to be enforced pretty rapidly. 

Q. Do you know of any places where the sale of liquor has been stopped ? 

A. The only case that I know of was one that I saw the other day in 
Bromfield Street, where I happened to see them pouring out the liquor. 

Q. You assume that in this place the sale was actually stopped ? 

A. lam not at all sure about that matter. I know this fact, however. 
Night before last I happened to be in conversation with Dr. Day. His Wash- 
ingtonian Home is in the neighborhood of a number of bar-rooms, and it has 
been a very noisy region ; so much so that it has disturbed the residents there. 
But Dr. Day states that of late there has been peace and quiet and less noise 
in the streets than ever before during his connection with the establishment. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) The declaration was made yesterday by the learned 
counsel who is not present to-day, that formerly physicians prescribed alcohol 
too much, and they now prescribe it too little. Is that view correct ? 

A . I think there is a certain amount of truth on both sides. Physicians 
formerly used to bleed very often. That practice is not so common of late. 
It is partly a matter of fashion, and it is partly a matter of the change in the 
type of the diseases, which we all acknowledge. I think it is well enough to 
leave it to the physicians. 



804 APPENDIX. 

* 
Testimony of Kev. Gilbert Haven. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are editor of " Zion's Herald," I believe, at 
present ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. I want to ask you about your observations in foreign travel. What 
parts of Europe have you travelled in ? 

A. I have travelled through England, Scotland, France, Germany, Italy 
and Greece. 

Q. Do you know, from your own observation, whether wine is generally 
drank by the people in Southern France and in Italy ? 

A. I did not visit Southern France, but in France, Italy, and Switzerland 
it is the common beverage. 
" Q. Among the poorer people ? 

A. I should hardly say the poorer people. I should say that coffee was 
more commonly drank in France and Switzerland among the poorer classes- 
It is the beverage of the common people. I saw drunkenness in every part of 
Germany, and I saw drunkenness in France and Italy and on the Rhine. My 
landlord, at Assmanhausen, where I stopped, a few miles from Johannisberg, 
was himself what I called drunk. He certainly had very little command over 
himself. 

Q. Did you see any others who were drunk ? 

A . I saw a French officer fall drunk in the streets of Rome. I saw some 
men in Munich drunk on beer. I suppose that was partly because they 
oould not get anything else. 

Q. Did you see many ? 

A . Not so many as I have seen in New York and Boston. The habits of 
people arising from drunkenness have been exceedingly troublesome. In their 
whole character they are low and coarse. I saw the effects of them to some 
extent. People would sit, as they used to around our own taverns years ago, 
and sit until midnight, and in a state of semi-intoxication. 

Q. How large a number were there of these ? 

A. I should say that it was a very general sight. I never went to the 
country taverns where there were not these guzzlers around them, on Sundays 
and holidays, and even late at night. This is a custom which prevails among 
the peasantry. 

Q. Take the peasantry in Manchester, and in other large cities in Eng- 
land — their drink is heavier ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are they not a largely brutalized people ? 

A. They are, sir ; no other more so that I have ever met in all my jour- 
neyings. 

Q. Have you heard it stated that with those who drink strong liquors, if 
they meet with a cut or wound, it is almost impossible to cure them ? 

A. I have heard that statement from what I supposed to be good author- 
ity. I could not say anything further than that statement. I might say that 
I met with quite a number of temperance gentlemen in England and Scot- 
land, who said* that if their people could be raised up from this habit, they 
could be raised up more effectually in every other respect ; and that measures 
were being urged in this direction, and that they looked to us and to Massa- 



APPENDIX. 805 

chusetts men for the standard by which they were endeavoring to raise up 
their own population. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) If I understand you rightly, there is far less intem- 
perance there than in Boston and New York ? 

A. I said that I did not see so many in these places as I did in Boston and 
New York. 

Q. Did you express the opinion that drunkenness in the wine-growing 
countries of France, among the same class of people, was as great ? 

A. As far as my observation would go, it was quite as great ; and the effect 
upon the population was worse, because it was more general. 

Q. Then drunkenness in the streets of Paris was very common ? 

A. Not reeling drunkenness. 

Q. But you saw more intoxication ? 

A. No, sir ; I did not say that I saw any more than I said I had seen in 
New York. 

Q. Do you mean to say that you saw intoxicated persons in Paris ? 

A. I said I saw them in Munich. 

Q. Do you recollect any other cases of intoxication ? 

A. I remember cases of persons who were drunk on beer. 

Q. Do you recollect any other instances in this locality ? 

A. I spoke of three instances. 

Q. Do you recollect any other instances than these three, where they were 
really intoxicated and fell down ? 

A. I do not remember now of. their falling down. I recollect many cases 
of what I called intoxication. I do not remember now of seeing more than 
three that fell in the streets. 

Testimony of Prof. Henry G. Carey. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are a teacher of music ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Your residence ? 

A . Maiden. 

Q. Will you state your observation abroad in reference to intoxication ? 

A. My testimony will have to be short as my experience. I made a flying 
trip through Europe last summer, spending some five months. I cannot say 
that I noticed any cases of intoxication in wine-growing countries, except in 
Switzerland. I saw it in England and Scotland and in Switzerland, where I 
had the most opportunity for observing. I attended a musical festival at 
Lausanne, and we took an excursion on the lake. There was a large quantity 
of this white wine, as you would call it, drank ; and I saw no other kind of 
liquor there. Before night there was a large proportion of the persons on 
board who were drunk, and a great many of them dead drunk, quite a number 
of them fighting drunk, and more of them reelingly drunk. 

Q. Some of them mellow ? 

A. Yes, sir. I think it must have been upon the wine. I tasted of it to 
see what it was. It could not have been anything but the wine ; for there 
was no other kind of liquor there. 



806 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) They were nearly all musicians ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of E. L. Mitchell. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) What is your residence ? 

A. Boston. 

Q. Have you at any period travelled abroad and if so will you state the 
results of your observation bearing on the question of inebriety ? 

A. I have travelled in France and Switzerland and part of Germany, 
but my visits to other parts of Europe besides France, were very short. I 
resided in Paris two years and I have paid four or five visits there besides. 

Q. How long ago was your residence in Paris ? 

A. About fourteen years ago. 

Q. When was your last visit to Paris ? 

A. My last visit to Paris was about thirteen years ago. 

Q. Did you observe any facts that bear upon the question of the use of 
light wines in preventing drunkenness or the evil effects of alcoholic bever- 
ages ? 

A. I had always been told before I went to Paris that drunkenness was 
not at all prevalent there ; that the French were not a drunken people, and 
I supposed I should never see anything of drunkenness in that city. I recol- 
lect very well that the first morning after I reached Paris, after leaving my 
hotel, the first thing which I saw was a drunken woman. I should not, 
probably, have noticed the fact had I not been led to suppose that I should 
not find drunkenness there at all. I was employed at that time, on the 
English paper called Galignani's Messenger, and in the office of that paper 
were eight Frenchmen ; and two out of that eight were habitual drunkards. 
They were on the average drunk once a fortnight, both of them, and unable 
to do their business. I have visited with these men the barriers outside of 
Paris (all understand what the barriers are), and there I have seen a great 
amount of drunkenness on festival occasions. The drink was principally 
poor wine and bad brandy. 

Q. By using those adjectives you do not mean to eulogize any wines 
particularly ? 

A. No, sir ; I mean by that adulterated wine and brandy. 

Q. The population of Paris in large numbers go outside of the walls on 
holidays and on Sundays ? 

A. The working people do. 

Q. Is drinking more prevalent outside of the city than in ? 

A . Yes, sir ; because it is cheaper. 

Q. Are you able to state the relative excess of liquors outside the walls 
and within ? 

A . No, sir ; I can scarcely recollect at this present time. I know you 
could buy wine as low as six sous a litre, which is a little less than six cents. 
It would be about six cents a quart. I have heard it stated that beefsteaks 
would be some two or three cents higher per pound in coming into the city. 
It is not altogether to get cheap liquors that the mechanics go outside the 



APPENDIX. 807 

barriers ; it is because there are a good many restaurateurs and they sell 
cheaper ; and there are a great many gardens where people go. 

Q. Are there not amusements and entertainments ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And are these not arranged so that the visitors are seated and call for 
their wines at the tables during the performances ? 

A. Most of the amusement-gardens are outside of the barriers . 

These are the principal amusements. 

Q. The " Punch and Judy/' is that found there ? 

A. That is met with more in England; not so much in France. There 
are cafes within the city which are arranged so that you can go in and sit 
down and have your small glass of brandy ; and there is generally an orchestra 
there where musicians play. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Are there some sort of theatrical performances 
there ? 

A. Yet, sir; something of that class. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) At what time were you at Paris two years ? 

A. About fifteen years ago. 

Q. You speak of what you saw outside on these holidays. It has been 
stated here that the streets of Paris are very quiet on Sundays. Do you 
agree with that ? 

A. In the city itself? Yes, sir, it is quite as quiet. 

Q. Any drunkenness ? 

A. That is not my experience. 

Testimony of Kev. William F. Warren, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Will you be kind enough to state to the Com- 
mittee the result of your observations abroad as bearing on this question of 
drunkenness ? 

A. My first residence in Europe was in the years 1856, 1857, 1858, 
parts of these years — something over two years. My next residence com- 
menced in 1861, and continued something over five years. I returned last 
summer. I resided, for the most part, in Germany. I travelled, however, 
over a large part of Europe and visited the wine-growing countries, residing 
for some time — for several months — in these countries. My impression is, that 
between the two regions, the wine-drinking populations and the beer-drinking 
populations, there is very little difference. As regards that class with whom 
I was thrown into a more immediate contact during a part of my first resi- 
dence, the result of my observation was, that there was double the amount of 
drinking and of drunkenness among the students that there is among the 
same class in this country. As regards the people, I can only say that during 
the last five years, drunken people have gone past my house, I suppose, every 
evening, sometimes boisterously drunk and sometimes reelingly drunk. In a 
street, but a few rods from where I lived, there were brawls almost every Sun- 
day afternoon. Not only was beer drank freely, but stronger liquors. The 
seamstress who was largely employed in this neighborhood, and who also 
worked for us, had a drunken father and he was exceedingly poor, and she had 
been brought up in the practice of this vice. The woman who used to come 



808 h APPENDIX. 

and do house-cleaning and washing at times, had a drunken husband who was 
an habitual drinker, and I have no reason to think that this state of things was 
any worse in this neighborhood than in other parts of the city or country. 

Q. What city was that ? 

A. In Bremen. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) The remark which you make touching the students 
applies to the students in the University at Bremen. 

A. There is no university at Bremen. The universities where I studied 
were at Berlin and Halle. I have also visited other towns, and know some- 
thing of the state of things generally, in this respect. 

Q. You suppose the habit to be pretty uniform ? 

A. Yes, sir; there are, it is well known, associations of students called 
" corps," and I suppose one-third of the members of these " corps " ordinarily 
are in such a state once a week as to be unable to walk straight and to 
behave themselves upon the street. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How large a portion of all the students of these 
" corps " are given to this habit ? 

A. Much the larger part. 

Q. Then in the institutions there, one-third of the students are once a 
week what you would call drunk ? 

A. Worse for liquor, certainly. 

Q. That is universally so ? 

A. So far as my observation extends. 

Q. In the universities of Halle and Berlin ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What number of students are there there ? 

A. At Berlin there are two thousand or over. In Halle, about a thousand. 

Q. What are these, American or German ? 

A. German. 

Q. The statement, if I understand it, is, that the greater portion of these 
three thousand students are drunk every week ? 

A. No, sir ; I said that a greater portion belong to these " corps," and of 
these " corps," one-third were every week worse for liquor. 

Q. Have you noticed any intemperance anything like that elsewhere ? 

A . No, sir. 

Q. What is the article that they get drunk upon ? 

A. They drink beer more than anything else, and also the wines and 
stronger liquors. 

Q. Did you make any observation in Paris ? 

A. My observation was brief and some years ago. 

Q. Did you make any observation in any of the wine-growing countries or 
in the south of France V 

A. I am better acquainted with the south of Germany, though I have 
visited other places on holidays. I have found that drunkenness was an inva- 
riable concomitant of their festivals. 

Q. Did they get drunk so as to fall in the streets ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

0. What number ? 



APPENDIX. 809 

A. I am unable to state. 

Q. In the assembly, on the holidays, how many do you suppose you would 
see intoxicated ? 

A. I think it would vary a great deal with the occasion, and with different 
persons. Some would see more and some less ; but I suppose that one-tenth 
part or more, — in fact I may say one-fifth part, aro in an exhilarated state. 

Q. Well, a Frenchman is always in an exhilarated state. 

A. Yes, sir ; but I have seen some that are not. 

Q. What do you mean by an exhilarated state ? That people could not 
walk, or that they wanted to fight, or that, like the French, they were giddy 
and exhilarated ? 

A. I suppose the effects of liquor are different upon different tempera- 
ments ; but I have known people unwilling to go certain roads in the south 
of Germany, because of the numbers of drunken people that were swaggering 
about. I speak now of the wine-growing countries of Germany. 

Q. When these men were reeling and swaggering in the streets, were they 
called drunk, or were they able to take care of themselves, or were they hav- 
ing an exhilarated time on the holiday ? 

A. One finds them in all stages. 

Q. How great a proportion of these were swaggering drunk ? 

A. I have seen at times half a dozen in a group. 

Q. Is that an every-day business, or only on the holidays ? 

A. It is more prominent and noticeable on the holidays than any other 
time. 

Q. Do you know anything of the laws of France in respect to intoxicating 
liquors ? 

A. No, sir ; I never have resided in France more than a month at a time. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) In regard to the habits of drinking, so far as you 
have observed abroad, with reference to this point, stress has been laid upon 
the plan proposed that no open bars are to be allowed ; but that guests at 
eating-houses are to be served with liquors at the table. What have you 
observed in reference to this matter ? 

Q. So far as my observation has gone, I should judge that it might lead to 
a large consumption. Provision is made for the tables, and the guests, 
acquaintances, and loungers gather around the tables instead of drinking at 
the bar. They are accommodated with such easy places for lounging that 
they are apt to remain until very late into the night, and a portion of the day. 

Q. Is this method of drinking, namely, of sitting at tables, a common 
one observed ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Testimony of Kev. George J. Carleton. 
Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You hold the office of Chaplain of the State 
Prison at Charlestown ? 
A. I do, sir. 

Q. How many years have you been there ? 
A. A little over six years. 
102 



810 APPENDIX. 

Q. I would like you to state to the Committee the results of your observa- 
tion and conversation with convicts touching the matter of the use of liquor 
as a cause and occasion of their crimes, and touching their feelings with regard 
to open places of traffic and their love of drink, and any other facts which 
may have come under your observation regarding this subject. 

A. Well, sir, since I have been there I have conversed with over fourteen 
hundred different men, and I have spoken with them particularly with regard 
to the matter of intoxicating drinks, and I have found that out of that num- 
ber more than fifteen-sixteenths have stated that intoxicating liquor had 
something to do with their coming there, more or less. That is, they drank 
to a greater or less extent. And even those who did not drink have had 
friends and others who did, and were engaged perhaps in bar-rooms, and in 
that way it had had influence with them in the commission of the crime. I 
have found that all of the men (I think every one), who were there for the 
killing of their wives, have told me that that was done while they were under 
the influence of intoxication. I know that many of them feel that the pro- 
hibitory law is just the thing that they want and should have at once. They 
come to me before going and say that if they could only get somewhere where 
they would not be tempted, they could get on well enough. And some of 
them, with tears in their eyes, tell me that they hardly dare to venture out. I 
took a vote the other day among the convicts upon this question. There were 
five or six hundred present. I asked all those who were in favor of a prohib- 
itory law to raise up their hands ; and then afterwards, all those who were in 
favor of the other. And about half as many raised their hands for a license law 
as for a prohibitory law. Many of them are very decided in regard to that 
point, and think it is their only safety. 

Q. Did they pretty generally vote ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think about all voted, and the vote was more than two to 
one. 

Q. Has it been a rare matter for prisoners to express a desire to have some 
place of security from the open sale, on leaving the prison ? 

A. No, sir ; it has not been rare. 

Q. The question is sometimes raised here,, whether the influence of the law 
can have a tendency to morality or virtue. Do you find persons that have 
been brought there through the influence of liquors, after the influence and 
discipline of the prison, more or less incline to uprightness and right-doing ? 

A. Well, sir ; we think that is the case. 

Q. And these circumstances which you named seem to favor it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Have you anything further which you desire to state ? 

A. I do not know that I have anything particular to offer. I hope that, 
as Massachusetts has enacted this law, it will be carried out. I do not know 
as my own opinion is of any consequence ; but it seems to me that a license 
system having failed, that we should make a fair trial of the law we have got 
now. I want to have the law carried out ; and I want to have it carried out 
not only on Patrick Murphy and Bridget Maloney, but on the people who live 
in fine houses and drink their champagne, and keep it in their cellars covered 
with cobwebs. I want these men tried by law. There was a Frenchman, 



APPENDIX. 811 

once, who undertook to discriminate between the gout and the rheumatism. 
Put your finger, he said, in a vice and give it one turn, and that is rheumatism ; 
give it one other turn and that is gout. I believe that the license system may 
be considered the rheumatism, and we have tried it once. And now we give it 
another turn, and we want it turned thoroughly. I want the law thoroughly 
tried, and then if it will not do any good, we can go back to rheumatism again. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) If. I understand you, you do not believe that there 
can be any very efficient execution of this law, unless it extends to all places ? 

A. Yes, sir; I want to see the law carried out among high and low, rich 
and poor, and all classes. 

Q. No great good will come of it unless it is ? 

A. I want to see what effect it will have. 

Q. Do you believe that this or any other law can be executed by taking a 
certain class of dealers and leaving another class which is alike guilty ? Can 
you carry out such a law for any length of time ? 

A. No, sir; I do not think that is just the thing we want. 

Q. Do y6u believe that it can effect anything without that ? 

A. It will not be as effective for good as it will if it is carried out. 

Q. The policy of the law will be to take these low places. Could you, in 
the operation of the law for any length of time, carry it out in these low 
places ? 

A . I suppose not. 

Q. Then, so far as the execution of the law is concerned, it is defective in 
accomplishing the good that it is designed to accomplish, if it does not exclude 
the sale everywhere ? 

A. Well, the same as I would exclude other things. I do not find any 
" thus saith the Lord " in the Bible, that we shall make a license for the sale 
of liquor. 

Q. Do you find any " thus saith the Lord " for a prohibitory law ? 

A. I think there is. There is a principle to go against everything that is 
wrong. I believe that wine is injurious, and if if is it is wrong to drink it, 
I think it is wrong to sell it. 

Q. How is it in the State Prison, in regard to those who are sentenced for 
life ? After staying there, do they generally become reformed and religious 
men ? 

A. Well, sir, men who are sent there for life do not generally stay there 
for life. I have found, upon looking at the statistics, that the average term of 
those men who have been sentenced to the prison for life has been about eight 
and two-thirds years. They are almost all pardoned out sometime or other. 
There are some who stay. 

Q. How great a proportion ? 

A. It is very small. 

Q. What is the whole number ? 

A. I should say that out of 550, at the present time, there might be twenty 
perhaps who give evidence of being better men. 

Q. Do you attribute these changes to the fact that they are suffering 
punishment, or from the moral and religious influences brought to bear upon 
them? 



812 APPENDIX. 

A. Both, sir. 

Q. "Which is greater ? 

A. Well, sir, I should say the latter, the moral and religious influences 
brought to bear upon them. 

Q. Is there anything in the influence of law itself to bring about moral 
changes and moral convictions ? 

A. I do not know that there is. I do not feel prepared to give a decided 
answer, but my impression is negative. l 

Q. Then this matter of punishment is not reformatory of itself, so far as 
the law is concerned ? 

A. I do not think that, as a general thing, it is reformatory so far as to 
make the person in heart another man. It may reform the external life, and 
restrain him from doing a great many things that he might otherwise do. 
Theologically, I believe that a man may be reformed and not be thoroughly 
converted. 

Q. If you shut him up where he cannot get out, of course he would not 
drink? j 

A. No, sir. 

Q. But unless he has formed some conviction, when he gets out, he will 
drink ? 

A. He will be apt to. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Does the inability to get liquor lessen the appetite ? 

A. I think it does, sir. Say a man has been there a year. He says that 
he has been in the habit of drinking. During the year he has somewhat 
overcome that appetite, and he feels afraid to go out, for fear he shall take it, 
and then it will come back again, and then he is gone. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have you any more difficulty with the element of 
punishment in human government than you have in the divine ? * 

A. I do not know that I have, sir. 

Q. Do you not think that if the Divine Government involves punishment 
to good ends, human government may ? 

A. I should answer that affirmatively ; but still it is a theological point, 
and I should want an hour in order to go into that matter fully. 

Testimony of Rev. J. M. Manning (continued). 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You spoke the other day of your fear of the 
quality of the liquors that came from the State Agency ; that you had a bad 
impression of the management of the Agency, and expressed your intention 
of looking into the Agency. Have you done so, and if so, are you now 
satisfied in regard to the state of things there ? 

A. I have made some examination in regard to the present management 
of the liquor agency, and, so far as I have been able to ascertain, the agency 
is now properly managed. In the remarks which I made the other day, I 
distinctly stated that I did not speak from personal knowledge of the facts, 
but merely gave the impressions that I had received, partly, perhaps, from 
reading the public prints, and partly from conversations with various individ- 
uals, and perhaps the impression which I had at that time arose particularly 
from what I had understood to be the management of the State Liquor 



APPENDIX. 813 

Agency under a gentleman who I think was the first agent of the Common- 
wealth. 

Q. Do you refer to Mr. Burnham ? 

A. I think that he was the gentleman. My impressions were more par- 
ticularly associated with his management of the agency. I understand that 
Mr. Baker, the present agent, has the entire confidence of the community, 
and of both the parties here in controversy. Mr. Baker stated in his testi- 
mony that he shall consider himself very fortunate if he can leave, on retir- 
ing from the agency, as fair a record as his predecessor. I have inquired of 
other individuals in regard to their impressions of the management of the 
agency by Mr. Baker and his predecessor, and they confirm me in the opinion 
which I give, that at this time the State Liquor Agency is well managed, and 
that the liquors purchased from the agency may be depended upon as pure. 

Q. Do you consider that it was also well managed by his predecessor, Mr. 
Porter ? 

A. Yes, sir ; that is the opinion I have formed. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) I suppose that you have had no particular analysis 
made of the liquor sold by Mr. Baker, but gain your information by inquiry, 
from others ? 

A. I obtained from the State Agent, through the City Agent, who has an 
office in the same building, some liquors which are in my own house at the 
present time. I did think of having some liquors analyzed, and of bringing 
specimens here, but Mr. Spooner thought that it would not be necessary, 
especially as Mr. Read sent me, in connection with these liquors, a writing in 
which he stated that the liquors of which specimens were sent me, had been 
analyzed by Dr. Hayes, and the result of the analysis accompanied the liquors. 
I felt that he would not have d one that, if he were not sure that the liquors 
were pure. 

Q. The liquors that you obtained, were obtained from Mr. Read ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Mr. Read has been in that office four or five weeks, has he not ? 

A. I do not know how long he has been there. 

Q. Are you aware of the fact that prior to that time, and since Mr. Baker 
has been in the office, he had no right to sell you liquor upon the prescription 
of a physician ? 

A. I was not aware, until recently, that the State Agent had no right to 
sell to private individuals. 

Q. You violated the law if you got it elsewhere, and the State Agent had 
no right to sell to you. 

A. Somebody violated the law then, and I suppose, therefore, that I am 
particeps criminis. I did not know that such was the case until I was so 
informed within a day or two. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) I do not know how you use the term particeps 
criminis. Do you think, if you purchase a quantity of liquor of a person who 
has no right to sell it, that you in any legal sense violate the law ? 

A. I suppose that I do not. I will state another fact in regard to some 
liquors which I purchased from one who is engaged in traffic as a private busi- 
ness, purchasing of him, under the impression that I could not get liquor suit- 



814 APPENDIX. 

able for medicinal purposes, anywhere else. I purchased some liquors which 
were taken into the country by my family where they were spending the sum- 
mer, less than a year ago. In the course of the summer a physician was 
called, and it became necessary to use some of that liquor. This liquor was 
purchased as a pure article of Cognac brandy ; the physician pronounced it 
third rate Bourbon whiskey. That is my experience with the private liquor 
dealers. I am now buying at the City Agency, and hope to get a better 
article. I trust that my example may be pretty generally followed. 

Testimony of Hon. Valorous Taft. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) You reside in Upton, Worcester County, do you 
not? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are chairman of the County Commissioners of Worcester County ? 

A. I am. 

Q. For how long have you been so"? 

A. I am on my tenth year as Commissioner, and on my seventh year as 
chairman. 

Q. You have been in both branches of the Legislature, have you not ? 

A. I was two years in the House, and two years in the Senate. 

Q. In the discharge of your duties you are called upon to visit almost all 
the towns of the county, are you not ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I have performed the duties of Commissioner in every town 
in our county, fifty-eight towns in all. 

Q. You have been so interested in the subject of temperance, I suppose, 
that you have observed the sentiment of the people and the manner in which 
the law is enforced ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think I understand the sentiment of the people of Worces- 
ter County as well as almost any other man in the county. 

Q. What is the sentiment of the people on this matter of license and pro- 
hibition ? 

A. The sentiment of the people of the county upon that question is 
decidedly in favor of the present law, and that sentiment is increasing con- 
tinuously. 

Q. You say that the sentiment of the people of Worcester County is 
decidedly in favor of the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is the law having any appreciable effect in suppressing the sale of 
liquor in that county ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think there has been a steady increase of the temperance 
reformation ever since the law was upon the statute book, slow it is true, but 
sure. 

Q. Is there not a good deal of activity in the temperance cause ? Are 
there not a great many temperance meetings where total abstinence is 
preached and the pledge circulated, etc. ? 

A. Yes, sir, more so at the present time and for the last four weeks than 
formerly ; but my observation and my judgment are that there has been a 
growth upon the subject. I have given considerable attention to the subject 



APPENDIX. 815 

for the last thirty years, being a practical temperance man myself and associ- 
ating with gentlemen of that class. My duties as commissioner are to 
visit our houses of correction four times a year. When I came upon the 
Board in 1858 I found one hundred and fifty-seven or one hundred and sixty- 
seven inmates in the houses of correction. It being a larger number than I 
had supposed, I looked into the reasons why they came there, and the result 
of my observation was that seven-eighths of them came to the house of 
correction directly through the drinking of rum. Yesterday I visited the 
jail and house of correction at Fitchburg. There were fifty inmates. Saturday 
we had at Worcester fifty-four, making one hundred and four at present in 
all in the county. Ten years ago, about the same time in the year, we had 
one hundred and fifty-seven, and I think one hundred and sixty-seven. I 
have not been at the prison since Saturday, but I presume there are about 
the same number now there as then. Of these one hundred and four I 
suppose about thirty have been committed as vagrants. In the month of 
December there were fifty-four commitments to the two houses of correction, 
by the police court of Worcester, for vagrancy, something that we had heard 
but little of formerly. The number of vagrants being so large, my attention 
was called to it particularly, and I found that they were composed of a class 
of men that did not belong to our county. Some I found belonged in Salem, 
some in Marblehead, some in Springfield and some in New York. Upon 
inquiry I learned that the trains that came in in the evening from the south- 
west and north brought in persons who had no money, and of course they 
went to the station-house ; and the officers told me that it had become so 
frequent and had become such a nuisance, that as a matter of self-preserva- 
tion they took this course of committing them as vagrants, and they were 
sent over for three months. Thus the larger number were not sent there as 
drunkards. They were men who had been in the habit of drinking, but not 
drunk when arrested. They had no visible means of support and were 
passed over. Some of the Commissioners thought it wrong, and we advised 
our overseers to pardon them out, and several were pardoned out. 

Q. How many did you say ? 

A. I think there were fifty-four commitments from the police court of 
Worcester during the month of December. Of the most of those their terms 
have expired. I presume there are twenty or thirty now of that class of men 
who do not belong to our county ; so we really have not in our prisons to-day 
but seventy-five or eighty of our own population who should be there. 

Q. But ten years before you had 157 or 167 ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How many of those were committed for intemper- 
ance ? 

A. I should say about seven-eighths. I have not looked into that subject 
during the last six months ; but, generally, I should say about seven-eighths 
were committed for drunkenness. 

Q. The number of commitments, I suppose, does not necessarily decide the 
amount of intemperance in the community; but depends rather upon the 
vigilance of the officers, does it not ? 



816 APPENDIX. 

A. My experience is that the amount of intemperance depends upon this : 
the easier obtained, and the more plenty liquor is, the larger is the amount of 
drunkenness ; and the harder it is to get, and the fewer the places in which it 
is sold, the more temperate will the community be. 

Q. There are places where it is sold, I suppose, in Worcester County ? 

A. Just now, I think, it would be very hard to get any. 

Q. How has it been during the past two years ? 

A. There has been less intemperance during the last two years than there 
was for that period ten years ago, according to the population. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) How is it in Worcester now in regard to obtaining 
liquor ? 

A. The gentlemen who say they use it say that it is hard to find. They 
say that it is very dry times there — it is quite hard for them to get it. As they 
express it, we " have got it drove into a short corner." 

Q. Is the law against drunkenness enforced more rigidly than it used to 
be? 

A. I should say in about the same proportion. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) What would you say of the comparative amount 
of liquors used in your town or in Worcester County at present, as compared 
with the amount used ten or twenty years ago ? 

A. I made the statement the other day, that in my own town, according 
to the population, there was not one-tenth part of the liquor used that was 
used ten years ago. That statement having been called in question, I exam- 
ined more closely and revised my judgment, and put it at one-fifteenth rather 
than to increase it. I can only go back about thirty-five years. On my first 
experience of going to town meeting, they were lying out by the half dozen 
dead drunk ; but we have not seen that for the last ten years. 

Q. I know that your intercourse with the people is as general and as inti- 
mate as that of any other man in Worcester County. I would ask your 
judgment as to the question of drinking among the young men of that county, 
and among the active business men, the farmers, the mechanics and the clerks, 
as compared with what it was in former times ? 

A. It is not to be compared at all with former times. It is a rare thing 
with our well-to-do business men, our farmers and our mechanics, to indulge 
in the habitual use of liquors. There are a great many men who, if they 
were invited to your house and a bottle of wine was set upon the table, would 
not refuse to take a glass ; but if you were invited to their houses it would be 
very seldom that you would find any liquor. Of course gentlemen understand 
that in a county like Worcester, where there are few hotels in the country 
villages, my business calling me all through the country, I have to stop at 
private houses, and it is a rare thing that gentlemen offer me intoxicating 
drinks, even cider. 

Q. Is it not true that this prohibitory law is better enforced in some towns 
than in others ? 

A. Altogether. 

Q. And that it is better enforced at some times than at other times ? 

A. Yes, sir. 



APPENDIX. 817 

Q. Have you not observed that where the law is properly enforced there 
is an increase of good order and business, and a diminution of crime and 
pauperism ? 

A. Certainly, sir. I know where the convicts come from. "We expect 
them to come from the places where liquor is most sold. 

Q. They come from those places where liquor is sold, and where the law 
is not so well enforced ? 

A . They do. I would like to state another point in regard to the State 
Agency and its operation in my town. I can only speak for my own town. 
I think the citizens of my town do not, generally, patronize the State Agent. 
There has been more or less complaint of the liquors that have been bought 
there. When the law went into efFect, I was chairman of the Board of 
Selectmen. We appointed an agent, and the board sent me to Boston to buy 
liquors. I inquired who kept good liquors, and was directed to Moses 
Williams. I went there and bought a pipe of gin, a cask of brandy, a barrel 
of port wine, a barrel of sherry wine, a barrel of Madeira wine, and a barrel 
of alcohol of another party. I told Williams what I wanted the liquor for. 
He said he had some that was pure, and wanted me to test it. I said that I 
knew nothing about testing liquor, but trusted entirely to his judgment ; I 
was willing to pay what it was worth, if he would only give me a good article. 
I brought that liquor home, and there was more complaint of the quality 
of that liquor than there has been of any ever sold there since, though my 
judgment is that the wines I bought of Mr. Williams are as good as we ever 
had. I base that opinion upon the testimony of gentlemen who knew the 
quality of wine. Those who never drank but little wine, found particular 
objection to the port wine, and said that it was good for nothing. Those 
who had been more accustomed to the use of wine, said it was the best they 
had ever had. I got more cursings for the purchase of that liquor than for 
anything I ever did in my life. I bought it of Mr. Williams. There was 
more or less complaint found with the whole of it. There is less complaint 
of the liquor latterly than formerly. Our practice is to sell for what it costs 
us, and neither make nor lose on the sale. I stat e this because I have heard 
considerable fault found with the liquor agency. 

Testimony of Rev. Ezra S. Gannett, I). D. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You know the question at issue. We shall be 
glad to have you give your views upon the subject. 

A. It seems to me that a license law is wrong both in principle and in 
policy. It seems to me wrong in principle because it throws the sanction of 
the Commonwealth over a practice which leads to an incalculable amount of 
mischief. It seems to me wrong in policy, because I have never yet learned 
from any observation or from any testimony, that license laws could be so 
enforced as to prevent the great amount of intemperance in the Common- 
wealth. I think, therefore, some more stringent measure than a license policy 
should be adopted. I have been in favor of a prohibitory law, because it 
seemed to me that the trouble, suffering and wickedness that follow upon intox- 
ication, and the insufficiency of all other means, both legal and moral that have 
ever been tried, have never been perceptibly lessened by license laws, and we 
103 



818 APPENDIX. 

are now bound, as citizens of the Commonwealth, to resort to some other 
measure. And, then, a prohibitory measure having been introduced, a pro- 
hibitory law having been passed, it seems to me that it should be enforced. I 
feel that it would be wrong to repeal the prohibitory law until it has been put 
to such a fair and full trial that its inefficacy shall be established. I think 
that has never yet been done. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You say that you desire to have the experiment of 
the prohibitory law fully tried. Is there anything in the present arrangement 
that is going to secure the execution of the law in future more than formerly ? 

A. I do not know, sir ; and I do not know enough in regard to the law to 
answer your question fully. I only know that the law has not been enforced, 
and I believe that it can be enforced. Where the difficulty has been in the 
past I am not competent to tell. 

Q. There is no way of enforcing the law but by securing convictions by 
the juries, is there ? 

A. Of course not. 

Q. If under the prosecutions, as brought by the State Constabulary, there 
is the same disinclination to convict on the part of juries as formerly, will 
there be any real difference in the enforcement of the law ? 

A. I think that there is something else than disinclination that should be 
taken into account. Their consciences have been opposed to it. 

Q. Suppose that they will not convict, there is nothing in the law to cor- 
rect their consciences, is there ? 

A. No, sir ; the matter of conscience is beyond human law. If I found 
that juries would not convict, and believed it was owing to a disinclination, I 
should raise the question whether or not some still more efficient measure 
could not be introduced. 

Q. From your observations in Boston do you think it more difficult to 
enforce the liquor law here than in the country ? 

A. I think so from what I have heard. My observations, however, are 
confined to the city rather than to the country. 

Q. What do you think would be the effect in promoting temperance, or in 
suppressing intemperance, if the law were enforced in the country but not in 
Boston ? 

A. I do not like to recognize the possibility of the fact that a law for the 
public good cannot be enforced in the metropolis of the Commonwealth. 

Q. Your opinion, then, is that the law being right ought to be enforced, 
and therefore you assumed that it will be ? 

A. I have hardly said as much as that. It seems to me that it can be 
enforced, but I dare not say that it will be until it has had a more thorough 
trial. 

Q. Do you know of any other trial to which it is, or will be subjected, 
and by which the practicability of its enforcement can be tested, than those 
which have already been attempted ? 

A . I think if the State Constabulary should continue to pursue the course 
which I believe and hope they have pursued for the last year ; if a determina- 
tion were shown by the municipal, as well as the State authorities, to enforce 



APPENDIX. 819 

this law, and the moral sentiment of the people could also be aroused, and they 
led to sustain the legal action, I believe that the law then could be put into effect. 

Q. It all depends upon whether the juries could be brought to convict ; 
and if they decline to convict, are not the wheels of the machine stopped ? 

A. I have rather avoided answering that question in that form, because it 
obliges me to suppose that juries are not rightly constituted. I am hardly 
willing to make that admission. I have no right to believe it, but it seems to 
me to be nearly so. If there is to be no change in the character and conduct 
of the juries from what it has been within the last year or two, and no change 
in the law, I do not know that it could be enforced. Then the question would 
arise whether there may not be some change in the law which, though not 
setting aside the right of trial by jury, should yet secure the enforcement of 
the law. 

Q. Do you think that it would be a good policy to close all the bars in 
public houses and eating houses, although the public houses were permitted to 
furnish wine or cider to their guests at their meals ? Do you not think that 
such a change would be an improvement on the present state of affairs ? 

A. It might be in a moral point of view. I do not know what the per- 
manent effect might be. 

Q. No such thing as that has ever been seen in Boston under any system 
of law. The bars at which men go and drink their grog have never been 
closed in Boston to your knowledge, have they ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Now if the law were changed and so enforced as to accomplish that 
result, would it not be an advance in a moral point of view over any system 
of legislation we have ever yet had in Boston ? 

A. It appears to me that it would, if I understand the question fairly. 

Q. Do you not think that there would be more probability of enforcing a 
law of that kind than the present ? 

A. I do not think that I did quite understand your question. Are you 
suggesting that a different law from the prohibitory law should be tried ? 

Q. Yes, sir. 

A. I do not know what other law you have in mind. 

Q. I refer to a law that prohibits the sale and shuts up every open bar in 
the State, so that liquor, except, at meals at public houses, could not be 
obtained, and would permit no liquor to be drank at any store or shop where 
it might be procured. 

A. I think that the exception of allowing it be drank at meals would open 
a very wide door. 

Q. The question is if it could be enforced would it not be a very great 
improvement upon the present state of things, or do you think it would fall 
below that? 

Q. I think that the prohibitory law would better produce the desired 
effect. 

Q. Do you not think there is a difficulty in placing the Parker House or 
the Revere House, or any of those large hotels, upon the same basis that you 
place one of the low cellars ? 

A. There is a practical difficulty. 



820 APPENDIX. 

Q. When, therefore, you undertake to ask a juror to convict the keeper 
and declare the Revere House to be a nuisance, just as much and just as great 
a nuisance as the low groggery in a cellar on North Street, is there not a 
practical difficulty in the judgment of common sense men in undertaking to 
say that one is as much a nuisance as the other ? 

A. There is a difficulty in the judgment of most men. Whether I should 
consider them as more entitled to be called common sense men or not, I do 
not know. I think I should look at the principle involved, and I should find 
the principle the same in the two cases. 

Q. The principle is the same, but the practical effect is very different ? 

A . I do not know. 

Q. I mean the conclusion. The juror upon his oath says that one house 
is a nuisance — as great a nuisance as the other. Does anybody think that 
it is? 

A. With me the answer would depend somewhat upon what was meant by 
the word " nuisance." But if I am asked whether I think that the intemper- 
ance produced among the higher classes is any less a calamity than the intem- 
perance produced in the small, dark shops in North Street, I should answer 
that I doubted whether there was any essential difference. 

Q. Is there not a difficulty in enforcing the law against the low grog-shops 
in North Street, when the authorities select them for punishment, and leaving 
the larger houses, that under the law are equally guilty, unprosecuted ? 

A. I should think there would be. 

Q. Is not that one of the difficulties that the execution of this law 
encounters when you undertake to make it prohibitory — that the law is alike 
in all cases, and the application of it is different in different cases ? 

A. The application of the laws depends upon the prosecuting officers, it 
seems to me. 

Q. How long do you suppose the prosecuting officers should expect to 
prosecute these low places and leave the high places untouched ? 

A. I think they might do that for an indefinite period, but they would be 
neglecting a part of their duty if they did so. 

Q. Would they accomplish even the closing of the low places, while they 
left the larger places open ? 

A. I do not see why they should not. 

Q. I suppose that the system of law which would most effectually check 
evils of intemperance would meet your approval ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are not wedded, I suppose, to any particular form of law, or to 
any particular theory of law ? 

A. I am not. 

Q. If then it may be supposed that by any modification of this law it may 
be made more effective in checking the evils of intemperance than the pres- 
ent, I suppose that you would be in favor of that modification ? 

A. I should favor it if it did not involve the vicious principle of giving 
the direct or indirect sanction of the Commonwealth to this evil. 

Q. How does the fact of granting a license in the form that has been pro- 
posed, give to the evil the sanction of the Commonwealth ? We assume that 



APPENDIX. 821 

the right to sell liquor is a right belonging to everybody, inasmuch as the con- 
stitution and the laws of the country make this liquor an article of commerce 
and an article of sale, and the right of selling admits the right of buying 
necessarily. That is the real state of things when we look at it. But this 
sale of liquors is liable to be abused. If the Legislature are of the opinion 
that the present law cannot be fully enforced, that they cannot make an 
entire sweep clear through the State by it, may they not modify it and say — 
" We will go as far as we can, and not allow the sale under certain circum- 
stances," but yet seek to restrain no further than this point ? Would such 
an action of the Legislature approve or sanction the sale beyond that point ? 
A. If it could be put simply in that form, I do not say that it would. If 
the law should simply say that the State imposes a restraint, so far I think it 
does not ; but if you grant permission to sell to a certain extent, that involves 
a different principle. 

Q. It is not because the State grants permission that a man has a right to 
sell, but it is because it is a natural and legal right that he had before any 
law was enacted ? 

A. I should be obliged to say that in a common-sense light of the subject 
I looked at it differently. I should say that the moment the Commonwealth 
should say to a person engaged in this traffic, that if he will pay the State so 
much money the State will permit him to do something that other people 
cannot do, it would lend the sanction of the law to the act. 

Q. That would be true if this law granted permission to sell that did not 
exist before the law, but if there is a mistaken theory upon this whole matter, 
if the right is one that has existed and does exist independently of the action 
of the Legislature, would not the principle be different ? 

A. When I said that I had no theory in regard to the law, I meant in 
regard to the particular act of legislation ; but I have a theory, I think the 
Commonwealth is bound to support the morality of its citizens, and has the 
right to restrict individual liberty under certain circumstances. 

Q. And the limitation of that restriction would be that which would 
secure the greatest amount of public good ? 

A. There may be a certain amount of restraint and yet be connected with 
it a certain amount of indulgence, and thereby the law might license a man 
to do an act and restrain another from doing the same act. In such a case 
the law might do more harm than good. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Are you aware of the character of the legal pro- 
vision known as the " search and seizure clause " under the existing law ? 
A. I know very little of the law. 

Q. Are you aware that liquors believed to be held or which can be shown 
to be held illegally may be taken by authority of the State ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that those liquors, if a claimant appears, are brought before the 
Commonwealth, and if the jury agree in saying that they are not illegally 
held they are returned to the owner ; and if they agree in saying that they 
are not legally holden they are condemned and destroyed if found impure. If 
they disagree the cause remains open and the liquors are still held by the 
Commonwealth until they do agree. My question is : after such a state of 



822 APPENDIX. 

things, does it not appear that infidelity, even in the jury box, cannot defeat 
the law, since the holding of the liquors for a decision of the jury is a practical 
confiscation of the stock in trade ? 

A. I should think that would be the result. There are some things in 
the law that I do not quite understand, but I think that you have stated the 
fact. 

Q. You were questioned hypothetically whether if the prohibitory law can- 
not suppress the sale of liquor in the Parker House or in the Revere House — 
the Parker and Revere Houses were indicated — whether it could be made prac- 
tically successful in restraining the sale in the lower houses. Does not that 
hypothesis bear equally against the license scheme as against the prohibitory 
scheme ? 

A. I should think so. 

Q. Do you perceive any encroachment upon the rights of the people by 
the enforcement of a prohibitory law that would not be involved so far as 
applied in a license law ? 

A. I think I do, but I do not see in the prohibitory law any encroachment 
upon the rights of individuals which the Commonwealth is not permitted, and, 
if it sees proper, bound to make. 

Q. In what respect do you conceive that the prohibitory law infringes 
upon the rights of individuals, so far as the principle is concerned, more 
extensively than a license law ? 

A . I do not know that I understand the terms of the respective laws, but 
suppose that the prohibitory law laid a more severe penalty upon its violation 
than does the license law. 

Q. That remains to be seen. They propose to retain, as I understand 
their policy, the prohibitory law with its penalties, but modify that law by 
granting licenses ? 

A. Then, so far, they would be alike in their bearing upon individuals ; but 
I suppose that a prohibitory law would bear upon many more persons than a 
license law. 

Q. I grant you that natural rights are restrained under the government ; I 
grant you that what would be otherwise a natural right is, in view of existing 
evils, restraint by the prohibitory law ; but I wish to ask you whether, in so 
far as persons are prevented by the holding of a license under the license 
system, restrictions are not imposed upon them by the license law as stringent 
as the restrictions imposed by the prohibitory law ? 

A. The prohibitory law says to the people, •' You shall not do this." A 
license law says to some that they shall not, but to others that they may. 

Q. The proposition here is to so construct that law that while it says to 
some " you may," it says to everybody else " you shall not ? " 

A. Then the two laws would be upon the same footing. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) The principle I brought to your notice was this. It 
was not as to the character of the law, but as to its execution. Suppose, for 
instance, fifty men are alike guilty of violating the law, they are all exposed 
to the same penalty — the house of correction. Now, when the authorities 
undertake to select twenty of those fifty, or fifteen of those fifty, and prosecute 
them and send them to the house of correction, but make no attempt nor 



APPENDIX. 823 

movement to enforce the law against the others, but suffer them to go on in 
the violation of the law, can you expect that such an execution of the law, 
upon a part and not upon the others, can to any extent or for any length of 
time be carried out ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think the moral effect upon the community, by such a dis- 
crimination, would be bad ; but, generally, so far as the law is executed, its 
effect would be good. « 

Q. What effect do you suppose such a discrimination would have upon the 
juries and upon the prosecuting officers ? 

A. I think it would produce great disrespect towards the prosecuting 
officer. 

Q. What would be the effect upon a jury in securing convictions upon 
these cases ? 

A. I suppose that the jurors would consider the merits of the case, and 
not whether the prosecuting officer had done but a part or the whole of his 
duty. 

Q. Do you not think that it would be better if a discrimination was to be 
made between the different kinds of houses, that such a discrimination should 
be made by the law and not by the executive officer ? 

A. I think that the principle that would be involved in such a discrimina- 
tion, by the Commonwealth saying to certain persons that they might do 
wrong, would be bad in its tendency ; but the present law does not leave such 
discrimination to the officer. If he be an honest man, he will do his duty 
without such discrimination. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I suppose it should appear, in connection with the 
hypotheses that these questions have involved, that the State Constabulary 
are at work in a city of two hundred thousand inhabitants, where the liquor 
power is backed by an immense sum of money, testing the question whether 
the law can or cannot be executed. Will you think it unwise for the Con- 
stabulary to attack the enemy in his weakest point, and carry citadel after 
citadel as far as possible ? 

A. If I can turn your figurative language into plain language, I would do 
all I could to enforce the law, if that is what you mean. 

Q. And if it simply appeared that the Constabulary were hemming in the 
heavier dealers, and had brought them to a point where they were feeling 
that it was necessary to put forth every effort to save themselves, would you 
not think that the officers were acting wisely ? 

A. I should tell them to do their duty and enforce the law. 

Testimony op Dr. A. J. Bellows, (continued.} 
Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You desire to add something to your testimony 
of yesterday, do you not ? 

A. I was asked a question by Governor Andrew in reference to the dis- 
crepancy of opinion among physicians in regard to the nutritive property of 
alcohol, but I was not permitted to answer the question because of the shortness 
of time. I want permission now to answer Mr. Andrew's question, and not be 
compelled to answer the question simply yes or no, but to give a reason for 
my answer. There is a principle, a physiological principle, which I wish to 



824 APPENDIX. 

present to this Committee, that I think will settle this whole question in regard 
to the difference of opinion among doctors. It is a principle that whatever 
nutritive elements are desired by nature, must be furnished through God's 
own laboratory of vegetable creation ; that nothing can be permitted to enter 
the system but what has come through the vegetable world ; and that there is 
a very distinct and marked difference between physiological chemistry and 
chemistry pertaining to inorganic matter ; that everything that is not accord- 
ing to physiological chemistry organized by God in His own works, is poison- 
ous, and upon that principle we can see just what is and what is not to be 
used as nourishment. In the first place testimony is abundant, — and I have 
given some portion of it, — that alcohol is poison. The testimony of Youmans 
which is referred to, is very clear upon that point. He says : 

" It is a powerful antagonist to the digestive process. It prevents the 
natural changes going on in the blood. It impedes the liberation of carbonic 
acid — a deadly poison. It obstructs the nutritive and reparative functions. 
It produces disease of the liver. It has a powerful affinity for the substance 
of the brain, — being, indeed, essentially a brain poison." 

And my opinion then is, that, if we would act on that simple principle, we 
can easily see how the conflicting opinions of the doctors may be reconciled. 
Whatever is made out of the dust of the earth in God's own laboratory, is 
nutritive, and that which is not thus made, is poisonous. Alcohol is a disor- 
ganized substance out of sugar. Sugar is nutritive, and there are some 
chemists who assert that, because alcohol contains some of the elements 
of sugar, alcohol must, therefore, be nourishment. Upon that principle, 
nitric acid is nourisment, for nitric acid has more nitrogen in it than has beef- 
steak, and the nourishment in beefsteak is contained in the nitrogen, and our 
food is valuable in its nutritive property in proportion to the nitrogen it con- 
tains. Nitric acid, then, upon that principle, would have more nourishment 
than beefsteak ; but the difference between the two is, that in beefsteak God 
has made the food beefsteak from the food which the ox ate, and it is ready for 
the blood, — ready to be converted into blood, — whereas in nitric acid the 
elements are disorganized. This principle runs through the whole system 
of nutrition. If you take a grain of wheat and analyze it, you will find that 
it contains all the elements that are in the human system. The plant has the 
power to take up out of the earth that which is just adapted to the require- 
ments of the human system ; but, if the wheat is disorganized as it is in the 
production of alcohol, it becomes a poison. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) There are scientific gentlemen who differ from you 
in your opinion as to the nutritive property of alcohol, are there not ? 

A. I do not know that any gentleman has differed with me in opinion 
who has given the attention to the subject that I have. 

Q. But there is a difference of opinion between gentlemen connected with 
the medical profession and yourself? 

A. I do not know that there is. I do not believe that any man will come 
to me and say that he can put into the human system one particle of iron, or 
one particle of alcohol, or one particle of anything else which is not made 
through the natural processes which God instituted. 



APPENDIX. 825 

Q. I should like to inquire if everything goes through the vegetable crea- 
tion, as you state ? 

A. Yes, sir, through the vegetable organization out of the dust of the 
earth. 

Q. Is the atmosphere made out of the vegetable organization ? 

A. That is not nutriment. 

Q. Has not the atmosphere inhaled by the lungs as much to do in making 
up the blood of the human being, as food ? 

A. Yes, sir ; but it is not nutrition. 

Q. Then the aliment taken from the atmosphere does not come from the 
vegetable world ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. But an aliment comes out of the atmosphere that is necessary to 
system ? 

A. Yes, sir. So there is an aliment in nitric acid. 

Testimony of Hon. William E. Currier. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You reside in Newburyport, do you not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you hold any office there ? 

A. I am Justice of the Police Court at the present time. 

Q. You understand the question at issue here to be between the prohibitory 
law and the license system. Will you be kind enough to give your views 
upon the subject ? 

A. I am here and asked to give my opinion in favor of the present pro- 
hibitory law now upon the statute book, and I think that that law if properly 
executed can suppress the sale of spirituous liquors. We have had a very 
liberal state of affairs in Newburyport in relation to the sale of liquor for the 
last twenty years, and liquor has been sold there almost as freely as all kinds 
of merchandise, notwithstanding the laws we have had upon the statute book, 
because our City Government has always been in favor of a liberal construc- 
tion of the law. Consequently intemperance has increased there from time 
to time until the last year. Within the last year an effort has been made to 
suppress the sale of liquor by the execution of the present law. I might say 
that for nearly twenty years past nearly every grocer in that city has sold 
liquor as freely as any other kind of merchandise. Bar-rooms have been 
increased from time to time. Since the 1st of January, 1866, the effort has 
been made to stop the sale, and every public bar-room known has been closed. 
Grocers, I think, have stopped the sale of liquor entirely. I do not know of 
any person who sells liquor openly in Newburyport to-day. And the reason 
of the suppression of the sale is owing to the more vigorous enforcement of the 
present law. There has been no difficulty thus far in enforcing it and sup- 
pressing the sale. The records of the police court show that within six or 
eight months there has been a continual increase of intemperance and arrests 
for drunkenness ; but since the efforts of the State Constabulary to suppress 
the sale of liquor, the arrests have fallen off more than fifty per cent. I am 
inclined to think that to-day there is not one-fourth part of the liquor sold 
privately, or in any other way, that was sold eighteen months ago ; and 1 
104 



826 APPENDIX. 

attribute the decrease wholly to the efforts made by the State Constabulary 
to enforce this law. 

Q. Do you refer to arrests for all kinds of crime, or only for drunkenness ? 

A. For drunkenness alone. I notice in looking over the records of the 
court, less than one-half as many persons have been arrested for the last 
quarter as were arrested for the first quarter of 1866 ; and there were less 
arrests for the last quarter of 1866 than there were for the last quarter of the 
year 1865. I think, so far as my judgment goes, that the law could be 
executed with us without much difficulty. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Have you been a friend of the law, and hoped 
much from it from the beginning ? 

A. I have never taken an active part in it. Under the statute of 1852, 
the Mayor and Aldermen of Newburyport appointed, during the years 1854 
to 1860, as many agents to sell liquor as they saw fit, and nearly every grocer 
and apothecary in the city had a license to sell. Liquor has been sold there 
until within the last few months as freely as it has ever been sold in Boston. 
The commencement of the efforts of the State Constabulary to enforce the 
law was about eighteen months ago, and they have pursued their efforts up to 
the present time, so that now the sale is almost suppressed. I do not know 
that it is wholly suppressed. There may be places where it is sold privately, 
but I think that a stranger in Newburyport, to-day, would not be very likely 
to find any liquor. 

Q. Were the hotels, as well as the grocers and apothecaries, licensed under 
the former law by your Mayor and Board of Aldermen ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What year was that ? 

A. I think from 1854, but I will not be positive. 

Q. Before this law was enacted ? 

A. I will not be positive whether hotels were licensed or not, but every 
respectable grocer was appointed an agent under the law for the sale of liquor 
— not under this law, but under the law of 1852. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) What is the sentiment of a majority of the people 
of Newburyport upon this question ? 

A. The people are about equally divided. 

Q. One-half, then, are opposed to the prohibitory law, and the other half 
in favor of it ? 

A. I should think so. 

Q. Do you suppose that the present law can be enforced in Newburyport, 
so that there will be no sale whatever in the city ? 

A. I think it may be executed so as to suppress the sale of liquor as much 
as thieving and other crimes are suppressed. 

Q. Can you suppress it so that there will be no public sale ? 

A. I think so. 

Q. Can you suppress all private sale ? Will there not, in spite of all the 
efforts of the Constabulary, still be private sales ? 

A. There may be. 

Q. Is it not true that in Newburyport there are now private sales, so that 
anybody who desires liquor can get it ? 



APPENDIX. 827 

A. Not to my knowledge. 

Q. Do you suppose that anybody fails to get a bottle of wine who has been 
in the habit of drinking it, because of the enforcement of the law ? 

A. I think they find it difficult to get. 

Q. Do you expect, by the execution of this law, to bring about a condi- 
tion of affairs in Newburyport in which nobody, however accustomed to the 
use of liquor heretofore, will longer use it as a beverage ? 

A. No, sir. I think there are many people in Newburyport that, if they 
wanted wine or brandy, or any other liquor, would import it, if they could not 
get it in any other way. There are some who import for their own use at 
the present time. 

Q. Is it less wrong for them to import than it is for any man, who cannot 
afford to import, to buy his liquor there ? 

A. I do not wish to judge of that. 

Q. Have you ever expected, under the operation of this law, to see the 
time when the drinking of liquor will be entirely suppressed ? 

A. No, sir, nor under any other law ? 

Testimony of Eev. Willard ,Spaulding. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Of what church in Salem are you the pastor ? 

A. Of the First Universalist Church. 

Q. Will you state, as briefly as you can, the views you have formed upon 
the question here at issue ? 

A. I do not believe in a license law ; I think it wrong in principle ; I do 
not think that it could be put into execution ; I do not think that the parties 
who are licensed can or will execute the law against the men who are 
unlicensed. I am quite confident that the temperance people, in general, 
would not undertake to execute a law which they believe to be wrong in 
principle. I do, however, believe in the prohibitory law. I think it can be 
executed in Salem and in every other city of the Commonwealth, and I 
believe that this is coming to be the opinion of a great many of our liquor- 
dealers. They do not agree with us upon many points, but they seem to be 
coming to the conclusion that the prohibitory law is to be executed against 
them or upon them. I think if thorough work were made in executing the 
law in Boston that we could execute it a great deal easier in Salem ; but we 
are not without hope that our liquor-shops will be closed up whatever may be 
the case here in Boston. I know of some neighborhoods that want the pro- 
hibitory law upon the statute book and want it enforced for their own salva- 
tion. A week or two ago I was sent for to go to the lock-up, and found there 
a man with whom I was acquainted. This was on Monday morning that I 
was called to the place. He was taken up on Saturday for drunkenness in 
the street. He was tried on Monday morning and fined, and was to be car- 
ried to jail. That man told me, on my questioning him, that he could not 
endure temptation ; that when he came to town on Saturday he was deter- 
mined not to go near a liquor-shop, but when he came to town he could not 
resist the temptation and was drawn to his old places. I paid his fine and the 
costs and he signed the pledge, but the next week he was drunk in Salem 
again. The very first time that he visited the place after my paying the fine 
he was drunk in the streets again. He is an example of a large class of men. 



828 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You think that the temperance people would not 
enforce a law that they thought to be wrong in principle ? 

A. I think that the temperance men, in general, have no faith in a license 
law. 

Q. They think it is wrong in principle, and therefore make no effort to 
enforce it ? 

A. That is my opinion. 

Q. Do you justify other people who believe that the prohibitory law is 
wrong in principle in making no attempt to enforce it ? 

A . I believe that men who have no faith in the prohibitory law are not 
likely to seek to enforce it. 

Q. I asked you if you would justify a man who did not approve of the 
principles of the prohibitory law from making any effort to enforce it ? 

A. Perhaps I ought to have stated that temperance men, in general, have 
no faith in the practical results of a license law. 

Q. That is not answering my question. You said that temperance men 
did not approve of the principle of a license law, and therefore would make 
no effort to enforce it. Now, I ask you, if you would justify a man opposed 
to the principle of the prohibitory law from making any efforts to enforce 
that law ? 

Q. I believe that temperance men have very little faith 

Q. Can you not answer that question ? . 

A. I believe that temperance men have very little faith in the principle of 
a license law. 

Q. I am talking about a prohibitory law. I ask you the question if you 
would justify a man, who has no faith in the principle of a prohibitory law, in 
not making any effort to enforce it ? 

A . I should not expect them to make voluntary efforts for the enforcement 
of a law in which they had no faith. 

Q. But would you justify them in not making any effort to enforce it. 

A. I might, perhaps, justify them in their not making any effort to enforce 
a law in whose principle and in whose practical operation they had no faith. 
I do not think, under a license law, there would be proper men appointed for 
its enforcement, or men who were really seeking to execute the law 
thoroughly. 

Q. You say that there would not be proper men appointed under a license 
law. Does not that depend entirely upon the people of Salem ? Could not 
the appointing power appoint suitable persons to carry out the law ? 

A. I do not believe that a man who sells ardent spirits as a beverage will 
faithfully carry out any license laws that may be enacted. That is my 
opinion. I may be wanting in faith in humanity, but I have very little faith 
in that portion of humanity that is engaged in the liquor traffic. 

Q. You do not think that a man, under a license law, can sell liquor and 
be an honest man ? 

A. No, sir; or if he is an honest man he is a very poorly instructed one. 
If he is honest and continues in the sale, I think that he cannot have an 
educated conscience. 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 829 



TWENTY-THIRD DAY. 

Friday, March 29, 1867. 

The Committee met at 9 o'clock, A. M., and the hearing of testimony on 
behalf of the Remonstrants was continued. 

Testimony of Rev. John W. Olmstead, D. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Are you the editor of the Christian Watchman 
and Reflector ? 

A. I am. 

Q. You know the question at issue here. It is the preference between 
the prohibitory law and a license law. We will be obliged to you if you will 
state your views upon that point ? 

A. I have views and opinions which are the result of some observation and 
experience. I have served nine years as the pastor of churches, and twenty- 
one years in my present relation. During these twenty-one years, I have 
lived in Chelsea, Roxbury, Framingham and Boston. I have been led in pur- 
suance of my calling into a great number of pulpits in Massachusetts. In 
Roxbury, up to 1865, 1 had lived some thirteen years. During ten of those 
years, I was in the service of the school committee ; for two years I was 
Chairman of the Board, which led me over the city, and into the schools in 
all parts of the city. My observations led me to the conclusion that intem- 
perance, so far from having increased, had been steadily and surely on the 
the decrease ; and during my fifteen months or more residence in Boston at 
the South End in Ward Eleven, I think I have marked less and less of drunk- 
enness, and less and less of men intoxicated upon the sidewalks. The point 
that I would seek to raise is, that the licensing of anything of itself of a per- 
nicious influence must be wrong in principle ; and although prohibitory laws 
may not have been brought into efficient operation, yet all past history proves 
that whatever may have been the shortcomings of prohibition, the licensed sale 
of intoxicating drinks is an immorality, and that it can be no more regulated 
than you can regulate a conflagration. 

Q. Have you any further views that you would like to express ? 

A. That embraces all that I have to say. 

Q. What has been your observation about the country as to the practical 
effect of the present law ? Are you not aware that in a great many places a 
great deal has been done to suppress and diminish and root out the traffic in 
intoxicating liquors ? 

A. I remember having once passed a Sabbath in the town of Grafton, in 
this State, and I was told that there it was not possible for a man to get 
intoxicating drink. I think I have been witness of the fact that in many 
localities out of Boston the operation of the prohibitory law has been effectual 
to that end. 



830 APPENDIX. 

Q. Has it not, in your judgment, operated in this way, that the sale of 
liquor has been so suppressed and rooted out about the country that it has 
driven a great portion of the dissolute and hard-drinking class into the city, 
so that while intemperance has been decreasing in the country, for that 
reason it may not have decreased in the city ? 

A. Of course intemperance and all its abettors would naturally find a 
nestling place in Boston when driven from the country. 

Q. Have you looked over the plan which has been presented by the 
petitioners of the law which they propose to have enacted ? 

A. I have seen nothing except that it is proposed to license the sale of 
intoxicating drinks as a beverage. 

Q. Their plan is to permit the municipal authorities of cities and towns 
to license or not as they please the keepers of hotels, victuallers, grocers and 
apothecaries. How a victualling-shop can be much short of a bar, or a 
regular grog-shop, I do not understand. I would like to know what would 
be your judgment of the operation of such a law which left to each munici- 
pality to determine for itself the question of license. For instance, here is 
a cluster of half a dozen towns in the country which do not want a license 
and refuse to grant them, but in the centre of that half dozen country towns 
there may be one town which determines to grant licenses, and thus offer to 
the people of those half dozen surrounding towns the continual temptation to 
buy and use liquor. Do you think that such a law would be just in its opera- 
tion ? 

A. I should think that it would be very inequitable and wrong. 

Q. Would you not think that it would defeat the object of the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In effect, under such a system, would it not be possible to have as many 
different laws in the State as there are towns in the State, and to alter those 
laws every year ; and would it therefore not be opposed to our idea of equal 
laws ? 

A. I should think so if the matter is as you have stated it. I do not think 
that such a law would be practicable or feasible, and I think that the history 
of such legislation in the past is against the policy of licensing. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) If I understand you rightly you regard it as an 
immorality to license the sale of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. Yes, sir, I consider that the sale of intoxicating drinks as a beverage 
is an immorality. 

Q. Does the question of this immorality depend upon the use which is to 
be made of the liquor after it is sold ? You say that the licensing is an 
immorality. Did you mean to say that you get at the immorality of licensing 
by the use that the liquor is put to after it is sold ? 

A. I will re-state my statement. I think that the licensed sale of intoxi- 
cating drinks as a beverage is an immorality, and that it becomes such by 
necessity. 

Q. What do you mean by a beverage ? 

A . I used the term in its ordinary acceptation. 

Q. Do you include the use of intoxicating drinks for medicinal purposes 
when sold upon the prescription of a physician ? 



APPENDIX. 831 

A. I mean all such use as is not recognized under the present prohibitory- 
law as proper. I understand that the present prohibitory law allows its use 
under a wise regulation. 

Q. What is the regulation ? 

A. The regulation I understand to be that it is to be sold only by agents 
regularly appointed throughout the State, and this only for medicinal and 
mechanical purposes. 

Q. That relates to the sale of it by the town agents. They have the 
right to sell it for medicinal purposes and for the arts and for nothing more. 
Do you think that if a license were granted that permitted the sale of wine 
and intoxicating liquors for family or culinary purposes and not for a bever- 
age, that such a sale would be an immorality ? 

A. I do not see how that could be done. 

Q. That is not answering the question. The question is, would it be, if 
it was contained in a license law, an immorality ? 

A. I think if you mean by family and culinary purposes to include the 
idea of a beverage 

Q. I do not. I mean to use liquor for culinary purposes, as the ladies use 
it for pudding-sauce, for brandy-peaches, for mince-pies and for jellies. Do 
you mean that the selling of it for such a use would be an immorality ? 

A. I do not understand what that has to do with the matter before us. 

Q. The Committee is to decide whether the question is a proper one or 
not, and not the witness. If they consider it an improper question they will 
check me. 

A. I do not feel that I am called upon to answer questions that go all over 
casuistry. I feel that I am called upon to testify upon the subject of a license 
law, and I propose to keep myself to that subject. I do not suppose that I 
abrogate all my rights in coming here. I come to be interrogated upon a 
certain subject ; but if I can see the bearings of your question to the subject, 
I will answer it. 

Q. It is not the prerogative of a witness to say whether he will or will not 
answer a question ; nor is it for him to say whether a question is or is not rel- 
evant to the subject. The witness comes here to tell the truth. You have 
said that the licensing of the sale of intoxicating drinks as a beverage was an 
immorality. I ask you now if it is an immorality to license the sale of intox- 
icating liquor to be used for culinary purposes and not for a beverage ? 

A. I am not prepared to answer the question as it is now submitted, and 
as it stands in my mind. 

Q. If you cannot form an opinion whether that would be an immorality 
or not, will you be good enough to state the basis upon which you arrive at 
the opinion that it is an immorality to license the sale of intoxicating liquors ? 

A. My answer, comprehensively, is that in the light of all licensed sale of 
intoxicating drinks for the last fifty years, crime, in a very large majority of 
cases may be traced, directly or indirectly, to this cause. 

Q. Traced to what — the licensing ? 

A. To the sale of intoxicating drinks as a cause, either directly or indi- 
rectly at least, in my comprehension of the matter. If I recollect rightly, the 
statement has been made here during the present week by the Chaplain of 



832 APPENDIX. 

the State Prison, that a great majority of the convicts in the prison were 
brought there by the use of intoxicating drinks. Of course it would require 
a long time to go into the citation of evidence and facts by which I reach this 
conclusion ; but it is just as settled a conclusion in my mind as any other. 

Q. You regard then the sale of liquor as the cause of crime resulting from 
intemperance ? 

A. I cannot separate the cause from the effect. 

Q. Is it the only cause of crime ? 

A. I have not claimed that it is the only cause, but the chief cause. 

Q. The chief cause then, you say, of crime and misery resulting from the 
use of intoxicating liquors, is the sale of that liquor, — do you mean to say that 
the sale is the chief cause ? Is there no other instrumentality that helps to 
produce that mischief besides the sale ? 

A. The sale involves my view of that ancient woe of Holy Writ, — " Woe 
to him that putteth the bottle to his neighbor's mouth." It involves that. 

Q. f Now again, I ask you if the sale of a gallon of liquor is the chief cause 
of the evils of drunkenness which it produces — do you mean to say that ? 

A. I do not understand the question. 

Q. You stated that the sale of intoxicating liquors is the chief cause of 
intemperance and the crime resulting from intemperance. You understand, 
I suppose, what cause means in reference to an effect, and what a chief cause 
means with reference to an effect. Now do you mean to say that a sale of 
liquor is the cause of intemperance and crime ? 

A. I cannot separate the cause from the effect. 

Q. Is there any other cause producing intemperance but the sale, to your 
knowledge ? 

A. I have admitted in saying that the sale is the chief cause that there 
are other tributary influences. 

Q. Will you tell what those other tributary influences are ? 

A. There may be in certain constitutions a strong natural tendency to 
drink — a craving for drink. I believe in depravity. I believe that men are 
depraved, and that there is a going away from God and holiness in the nat- 
ural heart ; and in some men there is a strong tendency and craving in the 
direction of strong drink, and therefore the woe to which I referred becomes 
emphasized in its aggravation and wickedness. 

Q. Does the drinking of intoxicating liquors have anything to do with the 
intemperance that it produces ? . • 

A. Necessarily it does. 

Q. Do you mean to say that any sale of intoxicating liquors would produce 
any trouble if the liquor was not drank ? 

A. Of course not. 

Q. Is not the drinking of liquor one of the causes that produces 
intemperance ? 

A. Of course, I understand that. 

Q. Now, then, if there was no drinking at all, would there be any wrong 
coming from the sale ? If it was never drank as a beverage, would there be 
any immorality in the sale ? 

A. I am unable to answer that question. 



APPENDIX. 833 

Q. You stated that in your opinion it was an immorality to license the sale 
of intoxicating liquors as a beverage. But suppose that the license should be 
granted and the liquor never sold, and the liquor never drank, but used 
entirely in the arts, would there be any immorality in licensing the sale in 
that case ? 

A . I can say that if the use was restricted in the way you state that there 
would not be. 

Q. Do you mean to say, as a teacher of Christian morality and of ethics, 
you can predicate the idea of immorality upon the licensing ? The licensing 
itself does no hurt unless liquor is sold, and the sale does no hurt unless it is 
drank and wrong comes from the drinking. Thus you see the licensing is 
removed three degrees back from the act which results in crime or misery. 
Now do you undertake to predicate upon the remote act of licensing the 
question of the morality of the use of liquor ? 

A. My conclusion, as I endeavor to give it, is, that the licensing of the 
sale of intoxicating drinks as a beverage becomes by necessity an immorality. 

Q. Carry this thing one step further back. Would any evil come from 
the sale of liquor, or the licensing of the sale of liquor, if it was not only not 
used as a beverage, but God had so made the appetites of men that they could 
not use it ? 

A. I am not prepared to answer that question. 

Testimony of Hon. Benjamin Evans. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You know the question here at issue ; it is the 
question between a prohibitory law and a license law. We should like to 
have your opinion upon that question. 

A. I am in favor of a prohibitory law and opposed to a license law. One 
of my reasons for being in favor of a prohibitory law is, that it has not had a 
fair trial ; that it has but recently been generally considered constitutional. 
In the place in which I live — the town of Salisbury — and in Amesbury, since 
1835, there has been an increase of intemperance up to perhaps the last year. 
Since 1855 it increased until the close of the war, and since that time it has 
decreased. I mean that there has been an apparent increase, but not a real 
increase. There has been an increase of population. Perhaps some fifty or 
seventy per cent, of that increase in population has been almost exclusively of a 
foreign character. Those men of foreign birth have brought with them their 
drinking customs, and hence there has been an increase of intemperance. My 
own experience the past year as trial justice in that place is this : that out 
of fifty-one cases that have come before me, forty-six of them, directly or indi- 
rectly, were attributable to the use of intoxicating drinks ; and that of the 
fifty-one persons, thirty-seven were foreigners. In that connection I may 
state here, that looking over the police reports of Boston, I find that wherever 
there is that increase of foreign population there is also an increase of 
intemperance and an increase of crime; but among the American pop- 
ulation it appears to me that the drinking customs of the people have 
been rather on the decrease than the increase. In looking over the statis- 
tics of the Boston police report, I find that of the 17,954 persons who were 
brought up before the courts, twenty-six per cent, of them were born in the 
105 



834 APPENDIX. 

United States, and sixty-six per cent, in Ireland and eight per cent, were of 
other nationalities. I find of the lodgers who were not brought before the 
courts and tried, numbering 1.9,579, that sixty-five per cent, were foreign and 
thirty-five per cent, were of the United States. I find also by these statistics 
that there has been a decrease of the number of liquor-shops in Boston during 
the last year of 197. 

Q. During what period ? 

A. During last year. By the police report of Boston, there is a decrease 
of liquor-shops of 197. Of the 1,515 places remaining open, thirteen per 
cent, are wholesale. I think if you look at other cities where there is a 
foreign population, we shall find the same ratio holding true — that the crime 
and those who are arrested for drunkenness are mostly those of the foreign 
population. About a year ago, I saw in a paper, or in some document, that 
Hon. Linus Child said that some three-quarters of all the crime and pauper- 
ism of the Commonwealth was directly or indirectly traceable to intemperance. 
That led me to an investigation in regard to pauperism. On looking over the 
statistics of the Board of State Charities, I ascertained that to each and to every 
man, woman and child in the Commonwealth, there was a tax of $1.76 for the 
support of paupers. I find, in looking over the statistics of the diiferent insti- 
tutions of the State for the support of pauperism, that the cost of pauperism 
and crime to the State during the last year, amounted to $4,237,000. Of 
course not all of that is attributable to intemperance. I find that by some 
authorities as much as nine-tenths of the pauperism and crime are chargeable 
to intemperance. I think the statement of the Chaplain of the State Prison 
is that three-fourths are attributable to that cause. One witness, I think, said 
that ninety-nine hundredths could be attributed to intemperance which, I 
think, is the largest percentage I have heard mentioned. I find, on looking 
at the report of the opening argument of the hearing before this Committee, 
that it was admitted here that there were 5,474 places in the Commonwealth 
licensed by the United States authorities to sell intoxicating drinks. After 
one or two paragraphs, I find that the honorable gentleman admits that that 
was probably not one-half the number of places in the city that were selling 
liquor. He estimated that each place sold twenty glasses per day on the 
average. Taking that estimate at ten cents per glass, it would come to over 
eight millions of dollars. If we had that eight millions of dollars, and four mil- 
lions which is estimated as the cost of crime and pauperism resulting from the 
use of that liquor, we have an aggregate of twelve millions of dollars. Besides 
this, there are other costs which might be reckoned in, such as the loss of time, 
the loss of productive labor, and the loss to the resources of the Commonwealth, 
not only of those who, by their drinking customs lose their time, but of those 
who are manufacturing and retailing this article. Then there are other costs, 
such as the loss by fire, the loss by sea, etc., which result from the use of 
liquor. I think that I have mentioned some of the material losses that occur 
from this cause, to say nothing of the mental and moral anguish which it pro- 
duces in the Commonwealth. I am satisfied in my own mind, from what little 
observation I have had of license laws, that a license law would not be any 
more enforced than the prohibitory law ; that those who find an excuse now 
for violating the law, would also find the same excuse for violating a license 



APPENDIX. 835 

law. I think that we have a right to infer that from the opening address of 
the honorable gentleman before the Committee. He estimates that the num- 
ber of licensed places is only one-half the number that sell ; and, if all the 
assessors in the State manifested as much vigilance as the assessor in our 
district, where it is pretty difficult for the sellers to escape his notice, the num- 
ber of persons selling must be very great. It appears to me that there would 
be more difficulty in getting evidence under a license law than there now is 
in enforcing the prohibitory law. 

Q. Suppose that the license law was enforced against the unlicensed, what 
particular good would it do when so many were licensed ? 

A . I think that it would not have any good effect. A gentleman who is a 
member of the Senate, Mr. Choate, was in New York a short time since, at 
one of the licensed hotels. He asked the bar-keeper whether he was licensed 
or not. He said that he was. He asked him if he or his associates, who 
were licensed, attempted to break up the sale of liquor by those who were 
unlicensed, or had any detectives to watch for such purpose. He replied in 
the negative. As an illustration, he referred Mr. Choate to a party across the 
street who, he said, sold four times as much liquor as himself, but who had no 
license, and still was not interfered with at all. I was talking with a gentle- 
man from Maine the other day, and he said that, when they had a license law 
in Maine, as many unlicensed men sold as licensed. 

[Mr. Andrew declined to cross-examine Mr. Evans upon the part of the 
Petitioners, by reason of his being a member of the Executive Council, 
and believing the examination of members of the executive department 
before Legislative Committees, on questions of public policy, to be dangerous in 
precedent, and embarrassing to the Executive.] 

Testimony of Hon. Otis Clapp. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are one of the United States Assessors, are 
you not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The laws of the United States require that a man, in order to sell 
intoxicating liquors in any way, should pay for a license ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And that license authorizes them to sell only in conformity to the laws 
of the State, but any sale for the past few years has been in opposition to the 
State laws. I want to know whether, in your district, those who were sup- 
posed to be engaged in selling got a United States license ? 

A. They did. I am the Assessor of the Fourth District, which embraces 
the old Wards 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 and 9 of Boston, Cambridge, Chelsea, North Chel- 
sea and Winthrop, which is also the Congressional District. It is the Fourth 
Collection District. In that district in 1864, before the law establishing State 
Constables went into effect, there were 1,235 licenses granted by the United 
States. In 1866, there were 477, being a diminution of 758. The 1 ,235 
licenses were granted before the State Constabulary were in operation. The 
effective operation of the Constabulary force diminished the number of licenses 
in the district 758, between 1864 and '66. 



836 APPENDIX. 

Q. And you attribute this diminution almost exclusively to the vigorous 
enforcement of the law ? 

A. I attribute it entirely to the action of the State Constabulary. I had 
a good deal of conversation with some of my assistants in reference to this at 
that time. Old Ward No. 1, now No. 2, embraces what is called the " Black 
Sea," or North Street. The diminution in the number of licenses there was 
nearly 100. The " Black Sea " embraces all kind of dance houses and stores, 
where both large and small quantities were sold. The Assessor of that district 
is quite an energetic man, and feeling a good deal of interest in the matter — 
feeling, as all assessors do, a natural pride in letting nothing escape taxation — 
he has followed up and watched the progress of things, and he tells me that 
he thinks that the amount of liquor sold is diminished. He thinks that there 
is but little liquor sold in the places that declined to take a license, and that, 
for the most, those who declined to take a license have given up the traffic. 
The same may be said of East Boston. In East Boston there were 53 licenses 
in 1866 and 128 in 1864, and of those 53 many of them only sold beer. For 
instance, there are those who keep eating-houses who only sell beer, but they 
have to pay the same license for selling beer as for selling distilled spirits. 
My assistant has made it a particular point to watch, and he thinks that the 
sale of liquor has not increased, but, on the contrary, rather decreased. 

I have been requested by some parties connected with this investigation, and 
by some disconnected with it, to prepare some figures upon the general subject, 
with regard to the quantity of spirits distilled, the quantity consumed and its 
expense, in a variety of ways. I have, prepared a few figures, which, if the 
Committee will indulge me, I will read. 

I would like to remark, in the first place, that some dozen years ago I 
became connected with what was called the " Black Sea" Mission, or Union 
Mission, of which Father Mason was the missionary and Judge Russell the 
president. That brought me in connection with missionary operations, in what 
we call the " Black Sea." In 1859 I became connected with the Washing- 
tonian Home, and with other institutions that have to do with intemperance, 
consequently it has formed my mind upon this matter. I would like to say 
further, that I have never had much to do with the law. I have never studied 
it particularly ; but I have been identified with the movement of moral 
suasion. That has been my position heretofore. In looking at this matter, 
my mind was struck with a remark of Edward Livingstone, in the Louisiana 
Code, in regard to the prevention of crime, as follows : — 

" As prevention in a disease of the body is less painful, less expensive and 
more efficacious than the most skilful cure, so in the moral maladies of society 
to arrest the vicious before the profligacy assume the shape of crime. An 
offence perpetually incurs the loss sustained by its commission, and frequently 
of its repetition added to the expense of its punishment. To prevent an 
offence requires only the previous expense of education and refinement." 

Judge Sprague made a point in this hall at the time the question was up in 
regard to the fifteen gallon law. I was here and heard his argument, and 
was very much struck with what he said. He said that moral suasion should 
be largely in advance of the law, but that the law must follow it along in 
order to sustain what had been gained. The law was to act, as it were, like a 



APPENDIX. 837 

ratchet wheel and hold fast what was gained. He instanced the case of 
slavery as showing that in earlier years the universal sentiment was that 
slavery would die out ; and so firm were our forefathers in the conviction that 
this would be the case, that they omitted to prevent its extension by law, and 
the consequence was that opinions went back again, and hence our desolating 
war has been the consequence. I happened to be present a year and a half ago 
at the great temperance convention at Saratoga Springs. Ex-Governor 
Buckingham and Ex-Governor Dutton, of Connecticut, were present, and 
many other distinguished men. They had a very free and friendly discussion. 
Governor Dutton's idea was that the temperance men themselves were 
responsible for the non-execution of the law in Connecticut. That was 
amplified in various ways. They had discontinued their efforts ; they had 
stood, as it were, back to some extent, and let the law take care of itself. 
The consequence was that evil had resulted. I mention that merely as a 
fact in the case. 

I go now to an estimate which Senator Wilson recently made in a speech 
which he delivered in a temperance society in Washington. It is in regard 
to the number of the army of drunkards. That army, he said, consists of five 
hundred thousand persons, and fifty thousand of that number die annually, so 
that the army would be extinct in ten years were it not increased yearly by 
the. addition of fifty thousand. I have prepared some figures to show the loss 
to the productive interest of the country by the deaths of those fifty thousand 
per year. According to the statement of Mr. Hawkins, a reformed inebriate 
of Baltimore, the average age of drunkards is twenty-four years, and the 
maximum age twenty-seven years. That rule applied to all his early asso- 
ciates. According to the English insurance tables, which essentially agree, 
the prospect of life at the age of twenty-seven (which is the maximum age of 
the drunkard,) is twenty and three-tenths years. Now if the lives of this 
army of fifty thousand men could be prolonged twenty years, and they should 
earn upon the average two dollars per day, it would amount to the incredible 
sum of seventy-three hundred millions of dollars in all — nearly three times our 
national debt. If they could be prolonged even ten years, one-half the aver- 
age prospect of life at that age, their contribution would pay the national 
debt and leave a thousand millions over for other purposes. There is another 
element which should enter into this estimate, which is the loss of labor by 
preventable sickness. A few years ago the British House of Commons 
appointed a commission to investigate that subject, and the Earl of Carlyle 
was the Chairman of that Commission. His estimate was that the annual 
loss to the people of Great Britain by preventable sickness was one hundred 
millions of dollars. When I saw this statement years ago, it struck me that 
the loss in this country by the same cause could not be less than a hundred 
millions of dollars per year. Now that preventable sickness in this country is 
largely owing to intemperance. This impresses upon me most profoundly with 
the necessity of putting agencies in operation that shall have for their object 
the prevention of this sickness and the consequent loss to the country ; and 
my idea of prevention is mainly by moral means, but the law must come in 
also and harmonize with it. A great enemy of man is the intoxicating element of 
fermented liquors. It was given for a blessing, and is turned into a curse. An 



838 APPENDIX. 

example may be taken in the city of New York. There are more than one- 
half of the population of that city that live in tenement houses and in cellars. 
Their main social and spiritual comfort is in inebriation. They are almost 
beyond religious influence. How the Church and State can think of this mass 
of humanity without alarm and without some greater effort to change that ten- 
dency is one of the marvels of the time. The reason that I am so profoundly 
impressed by these facts is that I have been in the habit for ten or a dozen 
years past of going through the " Black Sea " and Five Points and witness- 
ing face to face this gigantic evil. The question arises, Where do the recruits 
for this army of drunkards come from ? The answer must be — From the 
ranks of the moderate drinkers. The problem in my mind to be solved is 
how shall we diminish the number of recruits. My answer is by moral suasion, 
ftnd the law working in harmony with it. What moral suasion has accom- 
plished in the past can best be seen by looking back to the day when Justin 
Edwards was identified with the temperance movement. In a letter from 
him to the Emperor of Russia, he says that more than seven thousand societies 
have been formed with more than one million two hundred thousand mem- 
bers ; that more than three thousand distilleries have been stopped, and more 
than seven thousand dealers have given up the traffic. Now in my judgment 
those were the efforts that need to be revived at the present time. We want 
a revival of that kind of movement. 

Few persons appreciate the burdens borne by the community caused 
directly or indirectly by intemperance. The State has expended in the 
construction of sixteen institutions since 1815, $2,366,728 ; and for current 
expenses for nineteen institutions, $5,166,344, making in all, over seven and 
a half million of dollars. It is estimated that from fifty to sixty per cent, of 
this expenditure is caused directly or indirectly by intemperance. In addition 
to this, the cost of prisons in the State, as given in the report of the Board 
of Charities, is two millions of dollars, and the cost of jails and houses of 
correction for the year 1866, is $271,670. The almshouses in the State have 
cost $1,725,985. The paupers for the year 1866 cost $757,778. That 
estimate is exclusive of the State almshouses, which are valued at $520,000, 
and for the year 1866 cost $213,000. The private charities of the State 
are estimated at one and a half millions of dollars. Now of all this expense, 
from fifty to eighty per cent, is to be attributed directly or indireetly to intem- 
perance. 

The question consequently arises, How can we best prevent drinking habits ? 
This question is now being agitated in Europe. In a recent letter by " Bur- 
leigh " to the Boston Journal, he speaks of organizations now going on in 
Europe having for their object the reform of the people in this respect. He 
says, — 

" The questions of reform now agitate England. . Great efforts are made 
to benefit the workmen. The chief amusements are got up under the lead 
of prominent men to elevate and keep workmen from ale and similar houses. 
On Saturday nights cheap amusements are held. Humorous and comic plays 
are acted and songs sung, and all are admitted at a penny a head. Penny read- 
ings are got up for the same end in chapels, and the attendance is good. On 
Sundays the halls and circuses and theatres are opened for worship and lay- 
men hold forth to crowds of attentive hearers from the lower walks of life." 



APPENDIX. 839 

I was gratified to learn that in New York they were attempting similar 
movements with similar objects. It has been gratifying to me to see the 
movement that has been inaugurated of opening our theatres and having our 
popular preachers hold forth in them on Sunday evenings. I have taken 
the ground for some time in the temperance society to which I belong that 
if they wish to keep men from forming intemperate habits they have got to 
take up this question and provide cheap'amusements for the people discon- 
nected from dangerous surroundings. I hope that all the places of amuse- 
ment in Boston will be occupied upon Sundays, not with their usual 
plays, but with instruction of a moral and elevating character. 

Q. I want to ask you about those United States licenses. They were 
reduced from some twelve hundred to less than five hundred, were they not ? 

A. The number of licenses in my district were reduced to four hundred 
and seventy-seven. 

Q. It will be said, I suppose, on the other side, that all who sell do not 
take licenses now, and that they then took them because they trusted they 
would protect them from the State laws. But there are heavy penalties now 
existing against the men pursuing that business, without taking out a license ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Some men are very vigilant, I suppose, in ferreting out places that sell 
without a license. It is their duty to do so, and the income of the govern- 
ment depends very much upon their vigilance, does it not ? 

A. The main feature is just as this : if any person finds that there is a 
place open and selling liquor without a United States license, and wants to 
make the informer's profit, he has only to go in and get one or two drinks of 
ale, pay for it, go out and go into the United States Court and enter a com- 
plaint, and he gets his share of the profit. It is a pretty dangerous thing for 
any person to sell without a United States license. 

Q. You are satisfied, then, that there are but very few who do sell without 
a license ? 

A. I cannot state from my personal knowledge, but that is what my 
assistants say, and it is their duty to be in the street constantly. 

Q. They satisfy you that such is the case ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I cannot doubt the fact. 

Q. What time of the year do they take those licenses ? 

A . They date from the first of May. Usually they have commenced taking 
applications in the month of March ; but the law has been changed lately. 

Q. How many have been taken this month? 

A. We have just began to take applications for licenses. The law was 
altered upon the second of March, and we have not yet gone far enough to 
form any opinion of the number that will be taken. 

An institution was formed within the last two years called the " Home for 
Little Wanderers." It received within two months over twelve hundred chil- 
dren. Of these six hundred and sixty-nine were given up to be put in places. 
One-half of those, it is estimated by the Superintendent, were brought 
to that condition through intemperance. Five hundred and thirty-one chil- 
dren have been received as day children. They are fed, and clothed, and 
instructed, while their mothers go out at work for the day. It is estimated 



840 APPENDIX. 

that from eight to nine-tenths of this class of children have been brought to 
that condition by intemperance. 

The question of insanity and idiocy caused by the use of spirituous liquors 
is worthy of consideration. " Intemperance," said Dr. Carpenter, " is the 
most potent, and aggravates the operation of all other causes." Wine-drinking 
produces insanity. Dr. Tyler, the physician of the Somerville institution goes 
into that question in his report, ancl states that he never had so many calls as 
during the last year, for this class of cases — insanity caused by intemperance. 
The cases he referred to were principally those of young men who had been 
made insane by the free use of wine. 

Mental debility in offspring is another result of intemperance. Of these, 
Plutarch says, " One drunkard begets another." Aristotle says, " Drunken 
women bring forth children like unto themselves." Dr. Carpenter quotes 
from Dr. S. G. Howe's report on Idiocy, made to our Legislature, that the 
habits of the parents of three hundred idiots of Massachusetts were learned, 
and nearly one-half of those parents were known, to be habitual drunkards. 
In one case referred to by Dr. Carpenter, where the parents were both drunk- 
ards, there were seven idiotic children. I mention this to show the dangers 
that beset us in this direction from intemperance. 

Dr. Macnish, superintendent of the lunatic hospital in Dublin, says that 
one-half the cases in that hospital are caused by intemperance. The physician 
of a lunatic hospital in London puts the number at forty-one per cent. Dr. 
Carpenter, after speaking of the effect upon procreation in a state of intoxica- 
tion, adds : " There is every reason to believe that the monomania of inebriety 
not only acts upon and renders more deleterious whatever latent tendency 
may exist, but vitiates or impairs the sources of health for several generations." 
This, it strikes me, is an illustration of the declaration of the Decalogue, that 
the iniquities of the fathers are visited upon the children to the third and 
fourth generations. Another result of intemperance that I have noticed is its 
effect upon the duration of life. The statistical tables prepared for life insur- 
ance companies show the advantages of sobriety. In England the average 
number of deaths at forty years of age is thirteen in a thousand, and of the 
insured it is eleven in a thousand. For all ages between fifteen and seventy, 
the average number of deaths is twenty in a thousand. In the Temperance 
Provident Institution, after an experience of eight years upon several thou- 
sand policies, the average number of deaths was found to be but six in a 
thousand, or about one-third of the general average, and less than one-third 
of the whole average. The quantity of spirits consumed is almost fabulous. 
According to the report of the commissioners, of which Mr. Wells is chair- 
man, there was manufactured, in 1860, ninety millions of gallons of distilled 
liquor. The amount required to meet the consumption was forty-five million 
of gallons. Of this, thirty-nine million of gallons was required for drinking 
purposes, and six million of gallons for the industrial arts. Of ale and lager 
beer there were six million of barrels, or one hundred and ninety-two million 
of gallons manufactured. This was all used for drinking purposes. The 
increase in that report is estimated at ten per cent. This, with the amount 
imported, leaving out the domestic wines and cider, is about two hundred and 



APPENDIX. 841 

forty millions of gallons, or about eight gallons for each man, woman and 
child. At this rate, every family of twelve persons would require three barrels 
of liquor. 

Q. Do you include the ale ? 

A. Yes, sir ; ale is liquor, and it is intoxicating liquor. The valuation of 
Boston in 1866, was $415,362,345. The value of the liquor interest is esti- 
mated at forty million dollars, or nearly one-tenth of the entire valuation. I 
mention that fact to show that society seems to be burdened, and its moral, 
social and material interests thrown backward by the perversion of so large a 
portion of this interest. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You attribute what you suppose to be the reduc- 
tion in the number of persons selling liquors in your collection district, to the 
activity of the State Constabulary ? 

A. It is my impression that it is owing to their efforts. 

Q. During what period of time ? 

A. Before and after. I compared the licenses granted before they com- 
menced their labors with those taken afterwards. 

Q. You compared the year 1864 with the year 1866 ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And what day in 1864 did you compare with what day in 1866 ? 

A. I compared the licenses granted for the year commencing May 1st, 
1864. Of course it would run into a part of 1865, and the licenses granted 
for 1866 would include part of those granted for 1867. 

Q. From what date in 1866 do you estimate ? 

A . I estimate from May to May. 

Q. Do you not know that the case of the Commonwealth against 
Maguire, on the 1st of May, 1866, which has been recently decided in the 
Supreme Court of the United States in favor of the Commonwealth of Massa- 
chusetts, upsets all the value or the formerly supposed value of the United 
States licenses as a protection for the seller against the action of the State 
authorities ? 

A. I am aware that there was a decision. 

Q. And are you not aware that that was the particular question discussed 
and decided by the Supreme Court of the United States only a short time 
before the 1st of May ? 

A. That brings to my mind that the decision, if I recollect rightly, came 
before we began to grant licenses, or about the time, and that there was an 
impression among some of the assessors that the sellers would decline taking 
licenses, and they did delay to some extent. In New York they declined to 
tak e licenses, but afterwards reconsidered it and procured them. 

Q. Do you not know that if a man takes a license from the United States 
to sell liquors and then undertakes to sell them contrary to the law of Massa- 
chusetts, that the mere fact of his having taken a license from the United States 
is one means by which the State Constabulary or other persons are able to 
detect and discover the sale, and that, therefore, people desiring to sell in 
secret have the strongest of motives not to have one of those licenses if you 
would give it to them ? 

A. Those matters were all discussed. 
103 



842 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you not know that it operated upon most of the people in that 
way? 

A. It may have operated upon a few in that way, but I do not think that 
it did upon many. 

Q. You referred to an estimate made by Senator Wilson in a temperance 
meeting in Washington ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are you not aware that both Senator Wilson and Speaker Colfax both 
stated in that meeting that there had never been so temperate a Congress — 
that there never had been such comparative sobriety among the people of 
Washington during the years that they had been there as there was during 
the present Congress and at the present time ? 

A. I am aware of that, and believe that it was true. 

Q. You do not understand that there is any prohibitory law prevailing in 
the District of Columbia at the present time, do you ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not. 

Q. Now, please to state again the estimate made by Senator Wilson of the 
number of persons dying annually because of intemperance in the United 
States ? 

A. Fifty thousand. 

Q. Do you know how he reached that conclusion ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. Did he give tne details ? 

A. He did not in that speech. 

Q. Did he give any authority for the statement ? 

A. He did not at the time that he made the statement. 

Q. Did you ever take any pains to analyze that statement or to prove the 
assertion that he made ? 

A. I never have. 

Q. Have you ever examined the statistics of mortality in this country in 
order to see how far such an estimate as that is borne out by the statistics 
actually returned by the sworn officers of the United States ? 

A. I have never gone over the statistics with particular reference to that 
subject. 

Q. Have you any idea how many persons in the United States now 
annually die of delirium tremens, which is the drunkard's disease peculiarly ? 

A. That is one of their diseases. 

Q. That is one disease, I know, and that is the most prominent disease. 
How many, do you suppose, annually die of delirium tremens in the United 
States ? 

A . I have not the facts. 

Q. Out of fifty thousand deaths from intemperance, what do you think 
would be a fair proportion of the deaths by that disease ? 

A. I could not say. J 

Q. Then you have no idea about it except what General Wilson gave at 
the time of the meeting ? 

A. I have some idea about it. 

Q. Then give us your idea ? 



APPENDIX. 843 



A. In considering the subject frequently 



Q. Please answer my question. What would be a fair proportion out of 
fifty thousand cases caused by intemperance, as stated by Mr. Wilson, for 
thoso dying of delirium tremens ? 

A. I have answered that question that I do not know. 
Q. Then I will turn to another point. Have you ever examined the tables 
of mortality to see the whole number of persons dying in 1860 in the whole 
United States, from delirium tremens ? 

A. I have not. 

Q. There were only 518 men and 57 women in the whole country who 
died from delirium tremens. 

A . I have not gone into that number, but 

Q. How do you understand the freedom of sale and the consumption as a 
beverage of the various spirits, wines and liquors, in the States of the north- 
west as compared with the States of the north-east ? 

A. I have not been over that comparison particularly. 

Q. Do you know whether there is or is not a greater freedom of sale and 
use of liquor in the north-west than there is in the north-east ? 

A. As I understand the matter, there is very little restriction upon the 
freedom of sale anywhere, nor has there been in past times, except in two or 
three of the States. 

Q. Which two or three States ? 

A. In two or three or four of the New England States — Massachusetts, 
Maine and Connecticut. 

Q. They are States of the north-east. Then you consider that the north- 
east relatively has more restrictions upon the sale and consumption of liquor 
as a beverage than the north-west ? 

A. The laws have been more stringent. 

Q. Do the laws amount to something or to nothing ? 

A. In regard to Massachusetts I think they have amounted to considerable 
in the country, but to very little in cities. 

Q. Although whiskey is freely made in the north-west, yet you say, as 
compared with the northeast, there is not so much restriction upon the con- 
sumption and use. Do you not know that the deaths by delirium tremens in 
the north-east are more than twice as many, according to the census, than the 
deaths by the same cause in the north-west ? 

A. I think the number of deaths by that disease is small as compared with 
the whole number caused by intemperance. 

Q. But I am looking now simply to a comparison between the north-east 
and the north-west, and I ask you if you do not know that, by the census of 
1860, the deaths by delirium tremens were twice as many in the north-east as 
in the north-west ? 

A. My answer is that I would have very little confidence in statistics 
where they gave the number of deaths by delirium tremens, for the reason 
that the people wish to avoid the odium that would attach to such a death, 
and would give the disease some other name. 



844 APPENDIX. 

Q. But they are just as likely, are they not, to want to avoid the odium in 
one part of the country as in another ? I am now calling your attention to a 
particular fact. 

A. I wish to answer the question in a manner which will do my own sen- 
timents justice. 

Q. Then you are not willing to tell me whether you do or do not know 
that relatively there is twice as much of delirium tremens in the north-east as 
there is in the north-west, according to the last census ? > 

A. I have not based my inquiries upon the last census in regard to that 
matter. 

Q. You have alluded to insanity as one of the results of intemperance. 
How many deaths by insanity do you suppose were returned according to the 
census of 1860 ? 

A. I have not the number in my memory just at this time. 

Q. There were three hundred in 1860, and four hundred and fifty-two in 
1862. Have you any idea of the proportion of deaths by insanity in the north- 
east as compared with the number of deaths by insanity in the north-west ? 

A .' I have not. 

Q. Would you be surprised to learn that, according to the census in the 
north-east, the proportion of deaths by insanity was eighteen in ten thousand, 
whereas, in the north-west it was only nine in ten thousand ? 

A. My answer to that would be, that those statistics out of New England, 
where statistics are thought a good deal of, are regarded generally by statis- 
ticians as very unreliable. 

Q. Are you not aware that these statistics are taken under the carefully 
prepared laws of the United States, by the United States marshals and their 
deputies in every district, under carefully prepared instructions, and returned 
on blanks which are furnished by the marshals for that purpose? 

A. I know that perfectly well, sir. 

Q. I will take another point. Are you aware that by the same statistics 
it is proved that the ratio of deaths by old age is seventy-six per cent, greater 
in the north-east than it is in the north-west ? 

A. I expect that it would be so, because the young emigrate to the north- 
west and the older stay at home. 

Q. Do you think that the young die faster in the north-west than in the 
north-east ? 

A. The old that die in the north-east die there because they have lived 
there. 

Q. Yon have alluded to the effect produced by the use of wine. I will 
call your attention to one illustration of that. The ratio, in all the United 
States, of deaths by old age, is stated by the census to be three hundred and 
five in ten thousand. Are you aware how many die in France of old age ? 

A. I have not examined their statistics ; but for all the statements that I 
have made I hold myself responsible, and can give my authorities. 

Q. Are you not aware that there is an item in the census of mortality 
that is returned thus : " Mortality from Intemperance," specifically not say- 
ing by delirium tremens, but from intemperance ? Are you not aware that 
the census of mortality for I860 shows that there were only nine hundred and 



APPENDIX. 845 

thirty-one in the whole number thus returned, and that the ratio of mortality 
from intemperance in the north-cast district is larger than the ratio of mor- 
tality from intemperance in the north-west district ? 

A. My answer to that is that very few persons are returned as dying from 
intemperance ; very few persons in Boston go to the City Hall and return a 
death as by intemperance. They return it under some other and medical 
name, such as " congestion of the brain," etc. 

Q. Then I will take your brain diseases. Do you not know that the whole 
number of persons who died' from brain diseases in 1860 was only 5,726 in all 
the United States, and from all causes, and that brain diseases are the partic- 
ular diseases most due to intemperance ? 

A . That only proves to me that the deaths are put down under other 
names. 

Q. Take another test then. Do you not know that whereas there is little 
over two per cent, of brain diseases in the north-east, there is only a little over 
one per cent, of brain diseases in the north-west ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. Do you mean to say that you think that Senator Wilson's guess, based 
upon no figures at all, ought to be considered as of more value than the statis- 
tical returns of the United States marshals, carefully made, and published by 
the Secretary of the Interior and edited by Dr. Edward Jarvis ? 

A. I mean to say that Senator Wilson's estimate was carefully made from 
good authority, and from statistics derived from a great variety of sources. 

Q. I should like to have you give me the statistics and an opportunity to 
investigate them ? 

A. I have not gone into them ; but I have given Mr. Wilson as authority, 
and I regard him as tolerably good authority in the matter of statistics. 

Q. Now, I regard myself as tolerably good authority in the matter of 
statistics, but I would not undertake to make such a statement to the Commit- 
tee on my own authority. I have endeavored to call your attention, as an 
intelligent witness and a man of experience and acquainted with statistics, on 
your honor as a gentlemen, to state the facts in your possession to the Com- 
mittee, and not your mere opinions about this subject ; and I ask you whether 
you suppose that a bold estimate, sustained by nothing which we can test, by 
any gentleman, is to be compared with the value of publicly prepared and 
recorded statistical information ? 

A . I do not understand that that statistical information is reliable relating 
to that point. 

Q. Kelating to what point ? 

A . To this of intemperance. 

Q. But does not the statistical information in regard to mortality give us 
the tabulated returns from the returns of mortality from all the known 
causes ? 

A. It does, under a hundred different names, and probably of those hun- 
dred different causes, intemperance is an element that enters into each. 

Q. Exactly ; and I called your attention to the deaths by brain diseases, 
which is a disease peculiarly induced by intemperance. I called your atten- 
tion, also, to insanity, which is another form of disease induced by intemper- 



846 APPENDIX. 

ance. Just give me another disease induced by intemperance, and I will try 
you upon that ? 

A. With regard to the question of insanity, I took Dr. Howe's statements 
and statistics, and Dr. Jarvis', who has also made statistics upon that point. 

Q. Where are those statistics ? • 

A. They are in the report to the Legislature. 

Q. I have been reading Dr. Jarvis' statistics all along ? 

A. Dr. Jarvis merely collated the returns that were made. Drs. Jarvis 
and Howe collected specific facts in regard to idiocy, and made their report 
to the Legislature, and I quoted from Dr. Howe. 

Q. Is there any statement or statistical information given by Dr. Howe 
contradicting any of the statistics that I have offered ? 

A. I have read from Dr. Howe's statistics, but you do not think that they 
agree with yours. 

Q. You alluded to the report made by Dr. Tyler for the year 1866, and 
just printed by the State Government? 

A. No, sir, not by the State Government, but by the Massachusetts General 
Hospital. 

Q, Have you the document in your hand ? 

A . I have.. 

Q. Which page of the report did you read from ? 

A. From pages 32 and 33, on excessive wine-drinking. 

Q. Did you observe this passage upon page 32 : " The excessive drinking 
of wines and ardent spirits has brought insanity upon many persons during 
the year. This indulgence seems to be increasing very greatly, and its conse- 
quences are indeed alarming ? " 

A. I did notice it particularly. 

Q. Then how do you think that tends to affect the opinion which you have 
already given in your examination in chief, that there is less consumption of 
spirits and wines now than formerly, and that the operation of the temperance 
laws have induced a diminution of consumption ? 

A. This is wine-drinking and 

Q. It is not wine alone, it is wines and ardent spirits. 

A. This relates — — 

Q. Please to answer my question. 

A. I will if you will allow me to answer it so that I can make my answer 
intelligible. 

Q. How do you reconcile this opinion of Dr. Tyler that insanity from the 
use of ardent spirits and wines is increasing, with the opinion that you have 
already expressed that owing to prohibitory laws the consumption of wines 
and ardent spirits has diminished ? 

A. I answer it in this way : I spoke particularly of the " Black Sea" 
region, and stated that the number of licensed places had been reduced in 
that region, and the general sale had decreased. I believe it has been reduced 
in all those places. In relation to this wine-drinking, it is young men in 
entirely a different sphere of life who arc mostly affected by it, and who could 
command drink at any rate if it was to be obtained anywhere in the United 
States. 



APPENDIX. 847 

Q. Have you ever taken pains to compare the opinion you have formed 
with the returns reported by the police captains of the several stations in 
Boston, from time to time, of the places where liquors -were sold, or believed 
to be sold ? 

A. Which opinion do you allude to ? 

Q. Your opinion relative to the reduction of the number of drinking-places 
in Boston ? 

A. I have noticed their statements. 

Q. Have you ever compared the returns made by your officers with the 
returns made by the police captains ? 

A. I have had them in mind. I cannot say that I have compared them, 
because they speak of the whole city. 

Q. They divide the city into police districts, and each captain returns his 
own district, and you can discriminate between the districts which are within 
your district and others, can you not ? 

A. The police districts are not divided as the assessors' districts are. 

Q. Is not East Boston by itself ? 

A. That may be. 

Q. Have you ever compared the returns by the police captains of East 
Boston with the returns made by your officers ? 

A. I have not. 

Q. Have you made up any statistics showing the number of places licensed 
and the number of places in which liquor is suspected to be sold without a 
license V 

A. I have the precise list of places that are licensed. 

Q. That is to say, you have a list of the assessments that you have actually 
made? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. But you have not prepared or had prepared any statistical reports 
giving the number of suspected places ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you act upon the presumption that there are no suspected places in 
your district ? 

A. I suppose that there are places that we have not yet reached. My 
remark is that my assistant assessors are in the street constantly, and it is 
their duty to hunt up these places. 

Q. Is that their sole business — to watch the liquor trade ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you any assistants whose sole business it is to watch the liquor 
trade ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then the only information you have upon that subject is derived from 
the reports made to you by the assistant assessors, whose duty it is to assess 
upon persons or property generally ? 

A. That is all. 

Q. And you have no detective police for the purpose of searching out the 
illicit and contraband trade ? 



848 APPENDIX. 

A. We are in constant communication with all the detectives, when we 
want information. 

Q. I am asking whether there is any separate detective force whose 
duties are to ferret out that class of persons ? 

A. There is a revenue agent whose duty it is to look after all cases of vio- 
lation of the law, but it is of violations in regard to manufacturers and 
incomes and spirits. 

Q. Is there an inspector ? 

A. There is one inspector for the district. 

Q. When the police captains give official testimony and evidence of 
their being a very large number of places where liquor is sold, and when 
added to that is the testimony of the Catholic priesthood, who penetrate pro- 
fessionally both by night and by day, all parts of the city, and when added to 
that is the testimony of various other visitors, — all of them arriving at the 
same conclusion and stating the same thing, — that there is a very large num- 
ber of unlicensed places where liquor is known or suspected to be sold, do you 
or do you not think the conclusion arrived at, and the testimony received 
from all those combined sources, is worth more than the negative results 
arrived at by your inspector and your assistants ? [Objected to, and question 
withdrawn.] 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) In relation to the comparative number of deaths 
from a given cause in the north-east, as compared with the north-west, what 
should you expect since the young emigrate to the north-west, and since the 
country is quite new ? 

A. That the old people, for the most part, remain in the east, and the 
young people go to the north-west. 

Q. Are the intemperate, or those in ill-health, or those lacking in enter- 
prise likely to remove to the north-west or elsewhere ? 

A. The intemperate are very likely to be the least active and the least 
stirring. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How long do you understand Ohio to have been 
settled ? The north-western district to which I refer includes Ohio, Michigan, 
and Illinois. How many generations have dwelt in those States ? 

A. I think I could answer that question by saying that Ohio has been 
settled from the first day that the boat floated down from Pittsburg, but I do 
not know the date. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Gov. Andrew asked you about the number 
of cases of delirium tremens, and of brain diseases reported as though they 
were the only ones caused by intemperance. Do you not know that many 
deaths resulting even directly from intemperance are not reported as being 
caused by intemperance, nor by delirium tremens, nor by congestion of the 
brain ? Do you not know that there are innumerable diseases resulting from 
the exposure and poverty induced by intemperance, which result in death ? 

A. I understand that consumption is also caused by intemperance, and 
that it also produces a great variety of other diseases. 



APPENDIX. 849 

Testimony of David Bursley. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are High Sheriff of Barnstable ? 

A. I am. I have been an officer thirty-four years and Deputy-Sheriff 
before that. 

Q. You have been an officer, in all, how long ? 

A. Over forty years, except five or six years taken out of the thirty-three. 

Q. What is the state of temperance in your county now ? 

A. It is very good. 

Q. Few places of sale ? 

A. I do not know of one in the county. 

Q. Are there secret sales ? 

A . No, sir ; very few indeed. There were some places before the State 
Constabulary were established. They have ferreted out those. I do not know 
of one in the county now where a person could get a glass of liquor. Thirty 
years ago, under the license law, there were frequent sales, and numerous 
places where you could get it, where it was not licensed. Under the license 
law, after the first year or two, people took out a few licenses and others sold 
without license, and it became notorious that a license did not have much 
effect, and they stopped taking out licenses. There were some prosecutions- 
very few indeed — of those who had not licenses. 

Q. Not enough to suppress the sale ? 

A. Not enough to suppress the sale. Our town has always been a very 
temperate town, but more so for the last two years than I have known it in 
my life before. 

Q. That you attribute 

A. To the Constabulary force. 

Q. Do you know how many cases there have been brought into the courts, 
under the notice of the police, in Barnstable, in the past year ? 

A. There has been a great number brought in, but not nearly all con- 
victed ; perhaps not more than half or two-thirds were convicted on account 
of the want of evidence. We have never had any trouble in convicting by 
reason of the jury, but the trouble has been with the evidence. 

Q. When the evidence is sufficient, the jury are ready to convict ? 

A . Always. 

Q. How about the number of cases of drunkenness ? 

A . There have been very few cases of drunkenness ; very few indeed. 

Q. Have you in your mind the number for the last year ? 

A . I think this last year there has not been but three or four cases in the 
whole county. 

Q. What is the population — about ? 

A. The population is about thirty-three thousand. 

Q. Do you think it would be a benefit to introduce a license law ? 

A. No, sir, I do not. If you will take care of Boston, we can take care of 
it down there. It comes in from Boston in every shape ; but there is scarcely 
a man that would go up to a bar and take a glass of liquor openly. 

Q. Are these expressmen ever prosecuted ? 

107 



850 APPENDIX. 

A. No, sir, not to my knowledge. I have known it to come down in 
barrels covered with hay, and marked as crockery ware, and I have known that 
it has been liquor in casks. 

Q. How many places have you supposed there are in Barnstable County 
where a person could go in and get liquor slyly ? 

A. I do not know of any place. I think the officers are looking for such 
places. 

Q. Do you not think it will be very unfair for towns in your county, where 
they might vote against license themselves, to have a licensed town right 
along on the border ? 

A. I do, sir. We have thirty-nine selectmen in our county, and I have 
taken pains to get their opinions in reference to a license law, and I doubt 
very much if they would pass it. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Had you reason to suppose that these packages, that 
came by express, were to be sold contrary to law ? 

A. No, sir. They came to different individuals. For instance: four or 
five persons would club together, and when the liquor gets down there, they 
meet secretly and each one takes his jug. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Did you ever see any notices sent out by the 
local agent, Hon. Levi Reed, calling attention to the fact that he is authorized 
to sell liquors ? 

A. I do not know that I have received one, or seen one. 

Q. Have you ever heard of such notices being sent out ? 

A. I have. Some of the Deputies have received such notices. 

Testimony of Hon. Edward Mellen. 

Q. You reside in Wayland ? 

A. That is my home, sir. 

Q. Do you think that a license law would be preferable to the present 
prohibitory law ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. How long were yott on the bench of the Court of Common Pleas ? 

A . About twelve years. 

Q. And you were Chief Justice how long ? 

A. From 1855 to 1859. 

Q. You were also prosecuting attorney at some time ? 

A. I was prosecuting attorney for two terms in Middlesex. 

Q. How long have you been practising at the bar ; since you commenced, 
I mean ? 

A. Almost thirty-nine years. 

Q. Your home is in Wayland and your business is in Worcester, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir. The question you put is whether I recollect the operation of the 
law under the license system. I do very well. I recollect the license question 
down to 1838, and then the new license system or fifteen-gallon law, the recol- 
lection of which is very fresh in my mind ; and in the operation of that law, as 
everybody is aware, licenses were given by the County Commissioners for 
quite a number of years after that body was elected ; and again the license 
law of 1838 was one that was very much discussed, and the state of public 



APPENDIX. 851 

opinion was such that juries were slow to convict. There was in some of the 
counties, a practice among the gentlemen of the bar to argue questions of law 
to the jury, as though the jury had a right to overrule the court ; and many 
cases of acquittal undoubtedly were procured in that way. I had not the 
honor of addressing one of those arguments ; I declined always to put to the 
jury any question of law which had been adjudicated. That law existed for 
a very short time, and that, with the opposition made to it, increased, undoubt- 
edly, the consumption of liquor. That is, it was one of the great means by 
which liquor was used as a beverage, and I have no doubt that that would be 
the result now, more especially, if, as I understand, the licenses are to be 
granted by each town, as I have heard it stated, though I have not seen the 
bill proposed. There would be a trouble in regard to a law of that kind, I 
have no doubt, and the trouble would be this. There would be a constant 
political agitation, no doubt, operating here for a license, because it would be 
lucrative, and keeping up political discussion from year to year, and officers 
being elected on the ground that they would or would not license. I suppose 
every man whose experience extends back thirty years will remember how 
this was discussed in town meetings and how far officers were elected under 
it — some of them very good and some not so good ; and I can see that the 
results would be carried into the elections in the same way as in the case of 
towns, and some persons would be making bids, I suppose, for offices. And I 
am sure it would increase the sale of liquors as a beverage. 

Q. Does your memory of the operation of the license system show that 
they were in the habit of really suppressing the unlicensed sellers effectually ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Did they not ordinarily license in the cities — in Boston, for instance — 
as you recollect the circumstances and the fact, as if it was of no particular 
consequence ? 

A. I should rather not give an opinion concerning that. It is not so fully 
in my memory that it would be entitled to much weight. I have seen the 
operation of the law in your city, particularly after the passage of the law of 
1852 (I refer to the restrictive law), and its operation upon the juries. There 
were many difficulties from juries believing that they had the right to judge 
of the law over the instructions of the court. Under the statutes that they 
passed in the same year, though the law was before that enactment precisely 
what it was afterwards, as expounded by the court, and precisely as it was by 
the Court of Common Pleas then ; and under that, when the prosecution was 
directed to convict for the sale of liquors, there was a great difficulty in 
getting an agreement of juries. Afterwards, prosecuting substantially for 
nuisances, there was no difficulty. 

Q. You believe it to be practicable to enforce the present law, do you 
not? 

A . If you mean stopping it entirely, I do not believe it. I suppose it will be 
diminished by the operation of it. 

Q. You think that it is practicable, and that there have been good 
effects arising from it ? 

A. I presume it would be, sir. I have no doubt of it. If you will just 
put your questions I will answer them. I have no theory to expound, and I 



852 APPENDIX. 

have not heard but a very small portion of the evidence that has been given 
in here. 

Q. Do you not suppose it is practicable to get this offence under about as 
much as you get that of gambling, or some even grosser vices than that ? 

A. It is more wide-spread and addresses itself to a greater number of 
persons. The passions of more are excited than in gambling or other vices of 
such a nature. 

Q. Well, proportionately ? 

A, I do not know whether it might or not, sir. I would say that in refer- 
ence to one point, that I have no doubt that a license law would raise 
a group of questions, and that it would impede very much the efficiency of 
this law for the next five or six years — perhaps more, perhaps always. There 
are a large number of cases that would be raised and carried up to the tribunal 
at Washington, and perhaps come back again before they got it fixed. Stable 
legislation, perhaps all of us know how it is, compared with one that is 
changing in practice and in words, so as to raise new questions of law that 
have been once settled, or rather the law once unsettled becomes not so easy 
to manage and enforce as before. We should have to decide again on the 
questions that we have had under the prohibitory law, it would be likely. 

Q. That would be the presumption, would it not ? 

A. It would be the course of law, unless we could have it in the very 
form of laws formerly used ; and then in connection with the prohibitory law 
you would have a great number of cases to settle. 

Q. So that the practical efficiency of the law would be diminished ? 

A. How much, you can judge as well as I. 

Q. It has taken us a dozen years to settle this question. In that respect 
you think this an advantage over any other new system ? 

A. That is my idea, sir. 

Q. What do you think of the justice of a system which allows every 
minicipality in the Commonwealth to have a law of its own and in conflict 
with the laws of other municipalities, on this subject, and changing every 
year ? 

A. I believe that that legislation which makes it equal for every citizen is 
best. I have said I thought it would be constantly changing, if the different 
municipalities were to license, instead of the various counties. The commis- 
sioners vary in their opinions, but I am sure that it would be a very objection- 
able feature. Those who desired licenses would address themselves to the 
electors, and perhaps they would get proffers from the various candidates for 
he office, thus keeping up constantly an excitement in the towns ; and that 
town that had the majority in favor of licensing, would have a large custom. 
You can see perfectly, how it would operate. 

Q. Then it would be very unjust towards the towns that did not license ? 

A. I think so, sir. 

Q. I would be obliged to you if you would just read the synopsis of the 
law which is proposed, and I would then like to ask you a question. 

[ Continued on page 858.] 



APPENDIX. 853 

Testimony of David Perham. 
Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are a resident of Chelmsford, I believe ? 

A. Yes, sir. I reside in Chelmsford proper. 

Q. What population is there there, sir ? 

A. In the whole town ? 

Q. Are there two towns ? 

A. No, sir. North Chelmsford is a village in the town. 

Q. Your village is called Chelmsford proper ? 

A. Chelmsford proper, it is called. 

Q. What population is there there ? 

A. I suppose, perhaps, North Chelmsford would compose nearly quarter 
part of the town, and the rest might be considered, in a certain sense, as 
Chelmsford proper. 

Q. About what is the population ? 

A. About two thousand in all, including Chelmsford proper. 
* Q. What is the population of North Chelmsford ? 

A. About quarter. 

Q. What is the state of temperance there, sir ? 

A. In speaking of this I should make a distinction between what I have 
called Chelmsford proper and North Chelmsford. In Chelmsford proper, the 
sale of liquor has been abated almost entirely for the last ten years, and there 
has been a very great contrast and diminution in the evils of intemperance 
compared with the effect under the old license system. I think it is perfectly safe 
to say that there has been a diminution, or at any rate, that there was ten 
times as much sold under the old license law as at present, or for the last five 
years. 

Q. Ten times as much sold ? 

A. Ten times as much sold, and ten times as much less of the visible 
effects of intemperance. 

Q. Is there no place in North Chelmsford where liquor could be bought 
secretly ? 

A . It is not impossible but that at Middlesex village there may be a place, as 
we might say a "dark-lantern hotel," for the accommodation of Lowell people. 
It does not affect the people of Chelmsford very much more than if it was not 
there. I have been connected with the temperance cause since 1846, and 
have known all the operations of it in Chelmsford and Lowell. My business being 
considerably in Lowell, I been familiar with • it there almost as Avell as in my 
own town. The statement of the sale being ten times as much is not to the 
point. Many of my neighbors consider it considerably more. Liquor has 
been sold in North Chelmsford most of the time. There has been a hotel 
open most of the time, and there have been for a considerable part of the 
time places where it was kept by foreigners. 

Q. Open, or how ? 

A. There have been times when it was open, and times when it was sold 
under fear, and therefore the contrast has not been so great. 

Q. And the sale not so much diminished in North Chelmsford ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Does Rev. Mr. Clark live in Chelmsford ? 



854 APPENDIX. 

A. He lives at North Chelmsford. 

Q. He does not seem to have great success, then, in suppressing intemper- 
ance in North Chelmsford as compared, with Chelmsford ? 

A. No, sir ; and therefore it would not be judged that a person living at 
North Chelmsford would be so competent to judge as if he had been living 
where it had been abolished to so great an extent. There was one place at 
South Chelmsford, three or four years ago, where a stranger came in and took 
an establishment there, and sold privately in the first place ; but it was soon 
found that young people were getting intoxicated, and people hunted around 
and found out this place, and requested him to stop ; but he said he had got a 
government license, and he was going to sell, and that they need not trouble 
themselves about it. He finally put out a sign, and his neighbors went to him 
and told him they thought he was mistaken, but he persisted in his course. 
Afterwards it was ascertained that he was not protected by a government 
license, and they went to him and said that they had got some testimony 
against him, and advised him to stop. He investigated the matter and found 
out that he was at fault, and sold out and left town. This was a case against 
the opinion of the people generally, you will understand. The question has 
been argued by my friend Clark and others, as to temperance measures. I 
used to labor with him heart and hand, with our Honorable Mr. Child and 
others in the temperence cause a number of years ago, until in my opinion, 
and the opinion of the temperance community generally (that I know by 
facts), they have run off from the track in advocating a license law as a tem- 
perance measure. The temperance people of Chelmsford are almost unani- 
mously against a license law, and will send remonstrances against it. The 
people there do not suppose a license law to be an advantage as a temperance 
measure. 

Q. What do you think the vote of the people of Chelmsford on the ques- 
tion of license or no license ? 

A . I can state a fact that perhaps might be considered a test. Last fall 
the Rev. Mr. Clark was nominated after the Republican candidate was nom- 
inated, as an independent license candidate for State Senator. His district 
included Chelmsford, Dracut and Lowell. In Chelmsford he had less than 
one-quarter of all the votes. 

Q. In the whole town ? 

A. In the whole town, including his own village. In Dracut there was 
one-third, I think, or something like that, for a license law. In Lowell, as I 
understand (Lowell men can testify as to his success there), his vote was a 
scattering vote, composed of the Democratic party, and those of other parties 
that considered the liquor question of more importance than politics, and 
there was great run, or a great rush. I have heard it said that those laboring 
for a license law spent a great deal of money in endeavoring to carry the 
election. At any rate it has been reported to me that there was very great 
effort indeed from all the rum class, as you might say, to carry the election. 
Therefore we can conceive how much it might be considered a temperance 
measure, and who the friends of the license law are, as a temperance 
measure. 

Q. All the liquor folks voted for him ? 



APPENDIX. 855 

A. You might say that it composed them all. 

Q. You do not generally look to that source for practical temperance 
measures, I suppose ? 

A. We consider these men generally as those that wish drinking and sell- 
ing. In watching the movements of the temperance cause, I have noticed the 
fact that there is a class of men who are advocating a license law as a temperance 
measure, advocate it because the prohibitory law is not enforced. It seems to 
me that there is a reason why it was not enforced, during the last year, and 
especially during the war. We all understand that during the war people 
were willing to suffer almost anything rather than to distract the Republican 
party, which would be considered the life of the nation. Therefore they 
suffered it to continue. But now, as the war is over, I have reason to believe 
that the law can be enforced. 

Q. Is there not an improvement in the temperance feeling, both morally 
and legally ? 

A. I should think so ; and in connection with what I know in Lowell, I 
have been informed that many prominent places have stopped buying with 
the expectation of the law being enforced, and there is apparently a very 
great change indeed for the last month. I think I know of many grocery 
stores that from public declarations are to go out of it. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Chelmsford is a town where they make a good 
deal of cider, is it not ? 

A. Yes, sir, some. 

Q. The cider is very fine ? 

A. It is very good, I suppose. 

Q. Do they sell it ? 

A. Perhaps some do, and perhaps some do not. 

Q. Do you not know that there is a large manufactory there where they 
manufature and sell it to go all over the country-? 

A. Yes, sir, there is. 

Q. It is largely sold there ? 

A. It is sold there at wholesale. 

Q. Are there not very large quantities sold in Chelmsford to go all over 
the country ? 

A. I think it is not very large. It is quite limited indeed. 

Q. What is the usage among your people ? Are they teetotallers in the 
sense that they do not drink cider of any kind ? 

A. I think there are very few who call themselves total abstinence men, 
who do not drink cider. I can say that there is not a great deal of cider 
made there, and that a great deal of what is made, is made into vinegar. That 
is my business in connection with farming, and I have made as much as 
seventeen or eighteen barrels merely for vinegar during the year. I do not 
use it myself, or any of my family. 

Q. You spoke of Mr. Clark. You do not think he has been successful ? 

A. I do not think he is (what would be called) advancing the temperance 
cause, by any means. 

Q. Advancing the temperance cause is really the end to be aimed at, is it 
not ? 



856 APPENDIX. 

A. It is moral influence connected with law. I think that both should go 
together. 

Q. The object is to get the people of Boston from the use of intoxicating 
drinks, is it not ? 

A. I think it is, sir. 

Q. May not a man be very sincere in believing that a license lav/ is the 
best means of effecting this object ? 

A. He has a right to his opinion, I suppose. 

Q. I ask if he may not be sincere ? 

A. He may be ; I cannot say. But allow me to make one further state- 
ment as to nearly all the people of Chelmsford ; at any rate, all of the temper- 
ance community. I can say that they would feel it to be a very serious thing 
if a license law should be passed, and they should be forced to have any one 
licensed in the vicinity. 

Q. Are a large majority of the people against a license ? 

A . I think this was the case last fall. 

Q. Then there is no danger of there being any license law in your town ? 

A. I should think not, if they take control of it. 

Q. Are you aware that when you adopt a license law in any town, the 
people of that town must necessarily be in favor of it. 

A. I was not aware of the exact feature of the proposed system, whether 
it would be confined to the town or the county. 

Q. Then in speaking of Chelmsford, you supposed that the license of the 
sale was to be set up against the wishes of the people of Chelmsford ? 

A . I should think it would be if others had the control of it. 

Q. None of the petitioners having proposed that, obviates the objection ? 

A. I do not think it would very much, because my neighboring town 
might have it. 

Q. Have you not had that in your neighboring city of Lowell, so far, here- 
tofore ? 

A. I suppose it has been so that they could get it almost any time in Low- 
ell ; still there has been a very great diminution in the amount consumed, 
compared with former times. 

Q. Have the people of Chelmsford, if they wish, any difficulty in getting 
it at Lowell ? 

A. I suppose they can get it there ; or I suppose they have in times past. 
T do not suppose they could get it as well to-day. 

Q. You do not suppose that the prohibitory law has prevented the use of 
it in Chelmsford, nor that the people that wanted it could get it without any 
difficulty ? 

A. I can conceive that it is, indeed. 

Q. If there has been no difficulty in getting it, how did the law produce 
that diminution ? 

A. I can conceive that moral suasion will operate somewhat. 

Q. Then because it is not sold in the vicinity, and on account of the incon- 
venience of it, people go without it, do they ? 

A. On account of the inconvenience. Of course, if they sold it in the 
community it would be used to a greater extent. 



APPENDIX. 857 

Q. The question which I desfre to ask is : supposing there may be a differ- 
ence in that respect, would the difficulty be greater in enforcing the law in 
North Chelmsford than in Boston ? 

A. I suppose it would not be, 

Q. Now, it would be your opinion that it would be best that you have no 
license law in Chelmsford ; would you think it right for the people to say that 
you should ? 

A. I should not feel it so. 

Q. Do you feel that it is right to say that Boston shall not have her way 
because it is contrary to your opinion, while they judge it is better for them ? 

A. Perhaps we should have nothing to say about it, if they confined it to 
themselves. They having the liberty to sell would sell to our people. 

Q. But you say there is less drinking because of the inconvenience of get- 
ting it in Lowell. You have no idea that anybody will come to Boston to get 
it, if they would not come to Lowell ? 

A. Well, sir, if it is sold in Boston, it will be sold from Boston to Lowell, 
and from Lowell to Chelmsford. 

Q. Now I would like to know if you think it is really right for you to 
assume in Chelmsford to say what we should do in Boston, while everybody 
concedes that you should take care of your own interests in your own way. 
Do you think that is really a fair practice for men to act upon ? 

A. I suppose if our neighborhood generally should have a license, they 
would confine it to their own people. 

Q. In the towns in which there would be licenses, what would probably be 
done under this system. Has there been a moment that your people could 
not get as much as they wanted ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I can say that in Lowell people have been refused. 

Q. You do not mean to say that liquor has not been sold in Lowell V 

A. I think it is so at the present day. 

Q. Do you know anything of your own knowledge. It is testified in gen- 
eral that liquor is sold all over the town. You do not know of your own 
knowledge, do you ? 

A. Perhaps I could not speak as an eye-witness to it. 

Q. You do not know that there is no sale ? 

A . I could not say as an eye-witness. 

Q. Do you regard it necessary that the cities and larger towns should be 
prohibited from selling liquor ? You say that in cities this law should be 
executed, and that you are not willing that they should have much of any 
voice as to regulating their own affairs ? 

A. I cannot say that. If you sell in the cities, it is sold throughout the 
State. I think this State ought to say whether they shall sell it or not. 

Q. In view of that principle, what would be your opinion as to the State 
Constabulary undertaking to decide in Boston what class of dealers may go 
on and sell without their intefering, and what class cannot. Is that proper ? 

A. I should think it was their business to enforce the law as it is framed ? 

Q. What would you say of the law and the principle involved in it, the 
effect of which is to prohibit a certain class of dealers from selling, and not 
affect others ? 

108 



858 APPENDIX. 

A. I should say that Boston ought to comply with the law as well as other 
places.' 

Q. Supposing they find it necessary to make this discrimination, and say 
to the wholesale dealers, we shall not seize your liquors ; can you not conceive 
some difficulty in Boston in enforcing this law ? 

A. So far as that is concerned, I can conceive that there are some diffi- 
culties. 

Q. But here in Boston, with all the several instrumentalities which they 
have, they have got against a stump. Can you not conceive that in Boston 
we may have difficuties that you know nothing about in North Chelmsford ? 

A. There may be difficulties which we should not encounter. 

Q. Now are you willing that we should judge in Boston as to the best 
instrumentality for us in Boston (not to apply to you), to promote the cause 
of temperance, and the kind of legislation bearing upon it ? 

A. I should be willing if they would not disturb us. 

Q. Well, you know that it has been sold freely in Lowell most of the 
time for seventeen years ? 

A . There has been a large portion of that time when it has not been sold 
freely, and when it has been sold under fear. 

Q. It has been sold, nevertheless ? 

A. I suppose there may have been places, for nearly all the time, where 
certain persons who understood the manoeuvres could get it. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Brother Child, in speaking of the difficulties of 
enforcing the law in Boston, speaks of these large dealers, and of the Con- 
stabulary not having thought it expedient to seize their liquors at the present 
time. Do you not understand that these large dealers have their liquors in 
such packages that they cannot be seized ? 

A. Yes, sir; I answered that question in that way. 

Q. Do you suppose that to be a practical solution of the question ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you understand that that is the reason that they do not seize 
packages in that condition, which legally they cannot seize ? 

A. That is the way I understand it. 

Testimony of Hon. Edward Mellen (continued.) 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I would like to ask you now, since you have read 
the statements which were handed you, whether they do not open the way for 
a great many legal objections ? 

A. As it now stands, it is not drawn up so that you can see ; nor can any 
one, by cursory reading, see how far they might conflict. When a bill is 
drawn up, it might be seen how far they might be in conflict and how far that 
might be likely to arise. I cannot say how many questions may arise. 

Q. You see that there is provision for sale by grocers and apothecaries, 
and hotel-keepers and victuallers. Is there not room consistently with that 
synopsis to get up any number of grog-shops, if they only have pie or cake to 
sell? 

A. There have always been evasions of that kind, and such evasions would 
be seen here, undoubtedly, in towns where the public opinion is right, which 



APPENDIX. 859 

would be almost every town in the Commonwealth. I have no hesitation in 
believing that a law based on such a principle as this would increase the sale 
of liquor as a beverage. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You have spoken of the state of things that was 
observed by you a great many years ago, or, to begin with, about 1840 ? 

A. Coming down to 1838. 

Q. Beginning with 1828? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. As compared with the present state of things, do you not recognize the 
fact that there is a very great moral difference in the tone of society and a 
very different tendency in society, all over the refined and civilized world, 
Massachusetts included, concerning the practice of personal temperance, or 
self-imposed restraint ? 

A. There is, undoubtedly, a different sentiment now on the subject of the 
use of liquors as a beverage. The whole tone of public sentiment has been 
changed since that time. As for restraint, I have always observed the human 
mind is very restive under it, and I think the cause was the same forty years 
ago in that respect. 

Q. I said self-imposed restraint ? 

A. I ask your pardon. I did not so understand you. Undoubtedly there 
is. 

Q. You know, I suppose, or if you do not recollect it, you know from 
tradition and from reading, that from fifty to a hundred years ago it was not 
disreputable for the most respectable men to be intoxicated ? 

A. I suppose that was so, sir. I have heard it said so; but still there was 
a loss of confidence, of course, in any man who was in the habit of it ; but 
there was great leniency. 

Q. But all the way back, from forty or fifty years ago to a hundred years 
ago, in our Puritan community, do you not find it to be true, as shown his- 
torically, that the whole body of the people were suffering from over stimula- 
tion rather than from under stimulation — that is as a tendency ? 

A. I think it is so. You will observe it in a thousand ways. You will 
find old documents that will show that there was a greater use then than 
now. 

Q. So that what the people themselves are likely to do when living free 
and acting under the influence of reason, morality and judgment, is not pre- 
cisely the same as people would have done in any part of that period ? 

A . Perhaps it is not to the same extent ; but one having observed the 
course of action under the laws for some thirty or forty years, can see sub- 
stantially what the same population would do under a statute somewhat in 
the same form. 

Q. You mean, I suppose, that you can reason to some extent from the one 
to the other ? 

A. That is precisely my proposition. That I can tell substantially what 
the same population would do under the circumstances imposed by a similar 
law. 

Q. Now, do you not think that we ought to remember that we are dealing 
with a subject which includes, within itself, all the delicacies and subtleties of 



860 APPENDIX. 

the human mind, heart and character ; and that when legislating for the pur- 
pose of reducing the self-abuse of man, by wanton and careless misuse of 
things which have a certain degree of usefulness, we are under the necessity 
of carefully watching ourselves to see that we do not overwork the mechanism 
and neglect the moral dynamics ? 

A. Undoubtedly, that is true ; and all that I take into my calculations. 

Q. Well, now, going back to the time of the temperance reform, beginning 
at the time when, as I have learned, one in twenty or twenty-five of the voters 
in the old county of Plymouth were posted drunkards — going back to that 
time and coming up to now, and working out, under a moral influence and by 
the blessing of Almighty God, a great moral deliverance, do you not advise a 
certain degree of decorous caution in endeavoring to foist in a merely human 
machine, and works of art and man's device ? Do you not recognize the 
necessity of doing so ? 

A. Undoubtedly, sir; it is self-obvious. 

Q. Now, so far as the institutions of the law devised by the Legislature 
and executed by constables are concerned, in doing this work is it not 
necessary and absolute, in order to its having any great efficiency for good. 
and avoiding great efficiency for evil, that it should be so framed as to work 
side by side with the development of the feeling of the people and to unite 
the judgment of all or nearly all good men ? 

A. I should not wait for that of all good men, or nearly all men. Between 
all these opinions that is very difficult we all know, to manage. I have no 
theory to propose on this subject. I have none that I desire to propose 
except that which may conduce to the public good. And I was going to say 
that in all these it is exceedingly difficult on the one side or the other, to say 
how far you will restrain or let loose. There are many things that, as we all 
know, cannot be entirely restrained. This cannot be entirely restrained ; but 
I cannot say how far it can operate and control in this city, for instance. J 
cannot say how men are stirred up in this place or whether they feel any 
great interest in regard to the matter. My proposition, and yours, I presume, 
(it is immaterial what our private impressions are), is that it will produce a 
salutary check. We are all aware how under the license law many will 
protect themselves, and it is only in the prosecution that you can restrain 
these men. I go as far as any one else in the employment of moral suasion, 
of which we have heard so often, but there are, after all this is exercised, 
some men who will not be reached by it. 

Q. You admit that there are uses for alcoholic liquids, not only in the 
manufactures and in the arts, but also in connection with the human economy, 
both external and internal ? 

A. Undoubtedly it is so. 

Q. Now, when you come to the use, by the private individual, in his own 
house and in his own person, of an article lawfully existent, and which he 
may righteously use, you would not have the law interfere and undertake to 
decide for him ? 

A. Certainly I should not. The best regulation with safety to the com- 
munity would be my doctrine. 



APPENDIX. 861 

Q. Now, admitting that there is a certain quantity which must be sold 
and must be used, and when we come down to the last analysis, the ultimate 
use must of necessity be decided by the people themselves, and cannot pos- 
sibly, under Divine Providence, be decided by any government, do you not 
think it advisable that, while attempting to protect the public and preserve 
peace and order, we should seek to create as little antagonism between 
the people on the one hand and the government on the other, as possible ? 

A. Certainly, if it can be done so as to protect the people. The natural 
liberty of the people demands that there should be only so much restraint as 
is necessary for the public good, and not be a cause of friction and antagonism 
between the government and the people. Now when it comes to a question 
of retail distribution of these seductive and dangerous, but yet, for some pur- 
poses, useful and necessary articles, in a given community, would it not be 
better, all other things being equal, that that community or locality, for 
instance, Needham, Wayland, or Worcester, or Boston, should have something 
to say about the persons who should dispense it, and the circumstances under 
which it should be dispensed ? 

A . Undoubtedly ; and they do with the present law. 

Q. We will speak of that in a moment. But if there is to be a certain 
ultimate minimum of consumption reached, and permanently maintained, 
would it not be most surely reached and permanently maintained, by having 
the people of the locality themselves feel that upon their interest and constant 
vigilance and discussion with each other, that result in a great measure is to 
be obtained ? 

A. I do not think that it is so. I do not think that in the small munici- 
palities or the cities, it should be left finally to the people, because they have 
an effect upon adjoining municipalities and cities, and throughout the whole 
State. 

Q. Do not the town of Needham and the town of Wayland appoint their 
own liquor agents ? 

A . I am a little doubtful about Wayland ; I do not know about Needham. 

Q. If they are appointed at all, they are appointed by the towns, are they 
not? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are not in favor of that right being taken away from. the towns 
and having liquor agents appointed by the Governor and Council ? 

A. No, sir ; I think not. 
, Q. Therefore, for the purposes of distributing these things, the towns 
themselves should appoint for themselves ? 

A. For specific objects. 

Q. I understand that ; but you also know that the liquor agent, if he sold 
the article, has no power to control the use ? 

A. Of course not. 

Q. So that the town agent in Needham or in Wayland, if he sells to John 
Smith or Peter Gill, would not be able to prevent him from making improper 
use of it, and cannot be punished ? 

A. No, sir. 



862 APPENDIX. 

Q. That being so, do you consider that, on the whole, it is desirable that 
the government should come into the liquor traffic, or to the carrying on of 
any other business? Is it not better that the government, as a government, 
should be kept out of the traffic ? 

A. If it can be done with equal safety by other means, I would have the 
government kept out of it. 

Q. That is, if it can be done by other means ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Therefore is not the burden of proof on the government ? 

A. I should think so. 

Q. Do you not think that if our State should be enabled to swing around 
the whole traffic in pure alcohol and alcoholic compositions and beverages of 
every description from the wholesalers and manufacturers and retailers into 
the hands of government officials themselves, that there would be great peril 
that this business, amounting to many millions of dollars annually, would 
control the politics of the State instead of being controlled by the State ? 

A , I should fear so. 

Q. I should fear so, too ; and, therefore, is not that consideration one that 
we ought to consider in respect to this very kind of legislation which we have 
now in hand ? 

A. In all these, we are to set one against the other and take an eligible 
course. 

Q. Now let us go back to the subject of licenses. You have been asked 
to compare a possible license law with those which have existed, and to com- 
pare the probable operation of such license law. I suppose you recollect that 
the institution of the State Constabulary did not exist cotemporaneously with 
any of those license systems ? 

A. Certainly, sir. 

Q. Or the power to seize exist heretofore ? 

A. Before 1852? 

Q. It did not exist under the old laws, did it ? 

A. Of course not, under the old laws — not before 1852. I think there was 
none of that machinery in connection with the law before 1852. 

Q. Here are two new and powerful agencies. Now in proposing, as our 
scheme does, that the power to seize shall continue as to all liquors unlaw- 
fully held for sale ; that the Constabulary of the Commonwealth, as a means 
of public order, shall continue likewise ; and when you consider that all per- 
sons who may be complained of for selling without legal right will be subject 
to be indicted and proceeded against by the existing law just as it is now 
written and just as it is now interpreted by the courts, does not the difficulty 
relative to the interpretation and settlement of the meaning of the statutes 
for all practical purposes disappear ? 

A. Not to my mind. A law cannot very well be framed in regard to 
which some ingenious man may not frame an objection. 

Q. Now let us see. The town agent is authorized to sell. Suppose you 
say in your law another man may also be permitted or licensed or authorized 
by the town authorities to sell the same liquors. Will there be any more dif- 



APPENDIX. 863 

ficulty in indicting the second man or punishing him, than there is in indicting 
the first man ? 

A. Perhaps not ; but when you see the whole community agitated, and 
the question carried to Washington whether a man can sell under a govern- 
ment license, one can hardly tell what objections may not be raised. 

Q. That is to say, there is no telling what professional ingenuity or stu- 
pidity there may be. 

A. Be it so ; that is^not my expression. 

Q. I am saying that a second person is licensed to sell or forbidden to sell ; 
that is in connection with existing barriers. Is there any difficulty ? 

A. I do not know as there is. I have only said that it might be. When 
you get a law passed, or a legislative provision, giving liberty to voters, the 
whole thing rises up in a series of questions before the courts, and you will 
hardly get them down for a series of years. That is all that I mean. 

Testimony of Hon. Hartley Williams. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You are prosecuting officer for Worcester 
County, I believe ? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q. How long, sir ? 

A. I was elected in 1865, and so have been a little more than a year in 
the office. 

Q. Did you find any serious obstacle in the enforcement of the present law 
in regard to the traffic in liquors in your county ? 

A. No, sir ; no very serious difficulties. There is no very serious diffi- 
culty so far as the jury is concerned. The difficulty is in finding testimony. 

Q. Do you not find that it is, to a great extent, an aid in suppressing the 
traffic ? 

A . Yes, sir. 

Q. Is it not very largely restrained in Worcester County, by that 
agency ? 

A. I have no doubt that it is. 

Q. Do you think there is a very large amount of open sale in Worcester ? 

A. That is very difficult for me to answer. The officers could answer that 
very much better than I can. I have no doubt of this : that there are large 
numbers who, a year ago, were engaged in breaking the law, who have given 
up now, because of the prosecutions. 

Q. They feel that they are to be vigorously pursued, and that probably 
the State will be too strong for them ? 

A . That is probably the opinion. 

Q. Have you anything further that you desire to say, relative to the gen- 
eral subject ? 

A. I came here simply to answer questions. I have no speech prepared. 
I can say this : that I can hardly conceive of an instrument of more efficiency, 
— for that is the great object, and I suppose it is of all good men, — to sup- 
press intemperance ; and I cannot conceive of a law that could be more 
efficient than the present law. It may be imperfect, perhaps, but the experience 
of the last year, renders it a little dangerous to sell. I have heard that it would 



864 APPENDIX. 

be more so under the present law than under a license law. Of course, I 
have not had any particular experience in that and I cannot say whether it 
would be just as difficult to get the testimony in cases under that law as in 
cases of the violation of the present law. There is another suggestion, — 
perhaps not a reason, — why the law should be retained. So far as I have 
been able to learn from inquiry, those who sell and those who defend the 
sellers unite in the opinion that the license law is better than the present 
one. 

Q. The sellers ? 

A. Yes, sir ; and those who defend the sellers. 

Q. Practical temperance measures have not generally come from such 
sources, have they ? 

A. No, so far as I have observed. There is one other thing that has 
suggested itself to my mind, which is, that, ordinarily, in granting licenses, 
every person in the community who can pay for a license expects that the 
government will license him. I understand that in cases of this sort it is not 
proposed to grant licenses, except to a certain extent. One other suggestion 
occurs to me. One objection to it has been that probably it had not been 
enforced and could not be ; yet probably there has never been a time when it 
was more likely to be enforced than at the present time. I suppose it is well 
known that the Constabulary force, as it is called (I do not know how much 
has been said in regard to that), is a very efficient instrument for the execu- 
tion of this law. 

Q. You have no question that this vigorous enforcement of the law has 
caused this vigorous effort to get the law changed ? 

A. Well, sir ; that has suggested itself to my mind very naturally. I have 
not supposed that the temperance people were moving in this direction. I 
have not supposed that this movement for a change was from such people, 
though I have no doubt that there are temperance men in the community 
who are honest in their conviction that the license law would be the best ; 
but I think they would find that those who sell would be on their side. 

Q. Do you not find that the present law is not enforced in Boston ? 

A. I think that may be so. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You ^poke of the enforcement of this law. If 
nine thousand citizens of Boston petition for it, does it indicate a state of 
sentiment in favor of carrying out the prohibitory law ? 

A. That is a matter that you and the Committee could judge of as well 
as I could. I suppose that if a majority of the members of a community are 
opposed to a law, there might be and would be great difficulty in enforcing it. 

Q. Will a law of this peculiar character, which strikes at the private 
practice of individuals, and their acts in their families, with so great a senti- 
ment against it, be fully carried out, even with the most perfect machinery ? 
What is your experience in this matter as prosecuting officer ? 

A. I will say in answer to that, that the only difficulty I see in the way 
would be in getting a proper jury to try the cases. If you have men on your 
panel who believe that a law is wrong and that no man ought to be convicted, 
it would be very difficult to get convictions under such circumstances. 



APPENDIX. 865 

Q. In regard to this law as exciting a great deal of interest as it does in 
Boston, and a very large majority of the legal voters being opposed to it ; can 
you not, in that state of things, conceive that the people of Boston may think 
that they could promote temperance by some modification of this law ? 

A. I have no doubt that they might be so. 

Q. Now if a law of this kind were to be passed, permitting licenses to be 
given to public houses and to victualing saloons to furnish intoxicating liquors, 
and that only with food, and no public bar being allowed, and grocers being 
only permitted to furnish liquors to families to buy them and carry them away, 
and never to have them drink on the premises, and those licenses being held 
at the pleasure of the Mayor and Aldermen, and the present machinery left 
in full force in reference to the unauthorized sale and of violation of the law, 
—do you think that, under that system, as the present law is in Boston, we 
could promote temperance better than under the present law ? 

A. 1 have not analyzed that precise question, but my impression would be 
that you could not, and for this reason : that at present, I think that liquor- 
selling is generally regarded as a disreputable business. If you grant licenses 
it gives a respectability and character to the sale, which it did not have before. 
I think that the tendency would be rather to increase than to diminish intem- 
perance. 

Q. Is it disreputable for a man to sell a glass of liquor to me, if it is not 
for me to drink ? 

A. If the sale be in violation of the law it is disreputable. 

Testimony of Rev. Edward Otheman. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) I have called you to testify on one particular 
matter. There has been a good deal said about the sentiment of the clergy 
of this State. I understand you have taken some measures to ascertain that 
sentiment as far as practicable. Will you please tell us what they are ? 

A. As far as I have been able to hear from clergymen in Massachusetts, 
in writing, I learn that there are some nine hundred and sixty-two of these 
persons in favor of the present system and against or opposed to the license 
system. Fifty-six are in favor of the license system, and seven are undecided 
in their opinion. Of the fifty-six who are in favor of the license system, 
twenty-five of them are Roman Catholic, eight Episcopalians, twelve Trinita- 
rians, two Orthodox Congregationalists, one Universalist, five Swedenborgian 
and three of unknown denominations. 

Q. What measures did you take to ascertain ? 

A. I sent out a circular to all the clergymen, irrespective of denomina- 
tion, in the State, containing the question, Are you in favor of the repeal of 
our prohibitory liquor law ? 

Q. And they answered yes or no ? 

A. And they answered yes or no. 

Q. And the result was nine hundred and sixty-two to fifty-six ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Ypu received nine hundred replies, did you ? 

A. Over nine hundred letters. 

Q. There are how many clergymen ? 
109 



866 APPENDIX. 

A. About fourteen hundred. 

Q. They did not all reply ? 

A. Oh, no. The whole number that we have heard from is one thousand 
and twenty-five ; but wc have received over nine hundred letters. A portion 
of these gave their names in writing on remonstrances against the license law. 

Q. Did you receive nine hundred letters declaring distinctly as to opinion ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. No definition of what the license law was ? 

A . No, sir ; simply the question. 

Q. Nor the provision proposed by anybody ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. What was the question which you asked ? 

A. " Are you in favor of the repeal of our present prohibitory liquor law 
or of enacting a license law ? " 

Q. (By Mr. Siierman.) Do you know others than the fifty-six, aside 
from the answers to the letters .? 

A. I judge that there are a few, as I notice the testimony of some before 
the Committee. 

Q. These were not included ? 

A. These were not included. 

Mr. Child. The question, as it reads in the printed circular, is, " Are 
you in favor of the repeal of our prohibitory law and enacting a license law ? " 

Testimony of Edward Jarvis, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) How many years have you been a physician ? 

A. Thirty-six years. 

Q. Have you given special attention to statistics touching the subjects 
here under consideration ? 

A. I want to state more than statistics. I want to read to you the author- 
ity of one of perhaps the most learned scholars of the present time. It is 
Morel, of France, who has been, during 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Do you speak of the French or the English 
copy ? 

A. I speak of the French copy. It is a copy which I procured myself 
from France, being unable to obtain one in this country. M. Morel was con- 
nected formerly with various French hospitals, and a member of the Institute 
or Academy of Sciences ; and now he writes this book, — Des Degenerescences 
de VEspece Humaine, —±not that the whole generation is degenerating, but 
concerning the waste of constitutional force in the human family. He says, 
on page 48 of this treatise, that [translating'] this is remarked " in the abuse 
of alcoholic liquors and of certain narcotics, such as opium. Under the influ- 
ences of these poisonous (toxiques) agents there have been produced perver- 
sions so great in the functions of the nervous system that in the result, as we 
have demonstrated, are the true degeneracies of the present time, whether in 
influence direct from the poisonous agent, or by the transmission of hereditary 
power in the child." He says again that " the disastrous effects produced in 
the human economy by the abuse of alcoholic drinks constitute a malady." 
Then he makes a reference to a work, by a learned Swedish author, desig- 



APPENDIX. 867 

nated Alcoholismus chronicus, saying that be considers this one of the most 
effective of the causes of degeneracy in the human race. He says, — " Alco- 
hol produces a malady which offers the symptoms of a veritable poison 
(empoison nement)." I would call your attention to the fact that it is more 
than an accident that the same word is used to mean drunkenness, intoxication 
and poison. Toxique is the word used for poison, and it is more than an acci- 
dent that this was used to indicate the same thing. He says, — " Persons 
morbidly (maladivement) transformed in consequence of alcoholic excess, 
become a class of degenerated persons by intoxication." I merely report the 
salient points. Worse than all this, he says that the alcoholic influence viti- 
ates the constitution of the person himself who drinks, and gives him a pow- 
erlessness to transmit a full health ; that he transmits the health which he has 
to his offspring, and hence a health with a similar constitutional force, and 
with greater propensities for drinking alcoholic drinks. He then gives a lower 
health to the child, until it at last ends in powerlessness to transmit health at 
all. He speaks of the influence of alcohol upon the heritage and the consti- 
tution : " The physical degradation, the complete perversion of the intelli- 
gence and of the sentiments do not remain a state of facts isolated and 
belonging to the person who has passed away, but it is connected with the 
future and with the descendants. It does not appear until the victims of this 
deplorable habit at last become extinguished." * I will read one more from 
this, and then I am done with this book. He says that the first conditions of 
an alcoholic constitution are " immoralite, depravation, exces alcooliques, 
abrutissement moral." The second becomes hereditary intemperance, a danger 
of excess and mania, and general paralysis. In the third generation the tendency 
is to hypocondria, deep melancholy, ideas of being persecuted, and tenden- 
cies to homicide. In the fourth generation intelligence is scarcely or slightly 
developed, with the first access of mania early in life, stupidity, tendency . 
(transition) to idiotism, and probable extinction of that family through that 
crime. These are my views. I have looked at this matter physiologically. I 
began early in life to give attention to the causes of disease. When I was 
yet a student down here at Dr. Shattuck's, thirty-seven or eight years ago, 
the question occurred to me — What is the cause of so much disease ? I began 
to doubt the efficacy of medicine. And from that time I have looked to 
the origin of disease, and the causes that vitiate the human constitution, and 
render it susceptible first to disease, and then comparatively powerless 
to resist, and consequently more subject to the final consequences of 
disease. I will read from an analysis in the Boston " Medical and Sur- 
gical Journal" of March 22, 1866, of an article that I read before the 
Norfolk District of the Massachusetts Medical Society. Mr. F. G. P. Nel- 
son, Actuary of the Medical, Invalid and General Life Insurance Com- 
pany, of London, has taken great pains to ascertain the effect of alcoholism 
upon human life. I should say to you that these figures refer only to the 
intemperate class. It was his intention to " include only such persons as were 

* La degradation physique, la perversion complete de l'intelligence et des sentiments, ne 
restent pas a l'etat de ces faits isoles qui, n'ayant aucun rapport ni avec le passe des parents, 
ni avec l'avenir des descendants, disparaitraient tot ou tard avec les victimes de cette 
deplorable habitude. 



868 APPENDIX. 

decidedly addicted to drinking habits, and it was not intended to bring -within 
observation mere occasional drinkers, or what is usually termed generous or 
free livers." He says that the result among persons from 20 to 30 years old, 
among a general population, was an average of life 35 per cent, of the length 
of life that people should average. From 30 to 40, the average was 38 per 
cent, of life compared with the general population (which includes these also), 
and a loss of 62 per cent. From 40 to 50, the average was 41 per cent., and 
a loss of 59. They live, by this, less than half of the time that the average of 
people do at that time. From 50 to 60, the average was 51 per cent, against 
a loss of 49. At 60 and over, the average was 63 per cent., and a loss of 37 
per cent. Three life insurance companies in London, which insured on a 
general population, lost per thousand, 13, 14, 15 and 26. The Temperance 
Provident Life Insurance Company lost but r l\ per thousand. I have exam- 
ined carefully and analyzed the reports of mortality from the beginning of 
our reports, from 1841 to 1865, in Massachusetts, excluding Suffolk County- 
I find that the ratio of those who died from intemperance, including those 
who died from delirium tremens, from 1841 to 1850, was 530 in a hundred 
thousand deaths. From 1851 to 1854, it was 349 in a hundred thousand. 
From 1855 to 1860, it was 445 in a hundred thousand. From 1861 to 1864, 
it was 365 in a hundred thousand. And you must remember that this last 
period would include the Irish who bring a great deal of excess of intemper- 
ance. I have had a special reason for examining Lowell, because Mr. Clark 
sent me his book in which he said that intemperance was increasing in Lowell. 
I examined the reports from 1841 ; and I find that from 1841 to 1851 the 
number of deaths from intemperance was 56 in ten thousand of all deaths ; 
and from 1852 to 1865, there were 26 deaths from intemperance out of ten 
thousand of all the deaths. I have also compared the proportion of deaths 
from intemperance to the number of the population. In the period from 1841 
to 1851, 1 find that the proportion of deaths from intemperance was one in 
8,421 of the living ; and in the period from 1852 to 1864 there was a propor- 
tion of one in 20,667 of the living. 

[The session of the Committee was extended considerably beyond the usual 
hour of adjournment, and the testimony of the last witness was unavoidably 
cut short, and no opportunity offered for cross-examination.] 

Adjourned. 



APPENDIX. 869 



TWENTY-THIRD DAY— EVENING SESSIOF 

The Committee met at 7 o'clock, P. M., for the purpose of hearing testimoi 
in support of the petition from the Massachusetts College of Pharmac 
Samuel M. Colcord, of Boston, presented a memorial, which he read, in si 
port of the petition, and stated that it was desired that the Committee shou 
understand that those appearing in behalf of the College of Pharmacy, 
appeared not as partisans either for or against a license law, but appeared to 
present their case and tell the whole truth as to how they were situated, and 
were ready to answer any questions which the Committee desired to ask. 

After the reading of the memorial the following witnesses were called: — 

Testimony of Charles Edward Buckingham, M. D. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You are Surgeon at the City Hospital, are you 
not? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q. How long have you been in practice of medicine ? 

A. Twenty-two years this month. 

Q. You have had occasion every day to use wines or spirits in your prac- 
tice? 

A. I should think that I had. 

Q. Is there anything else that you can use to take the place of these 
articles ? 

A. That is a question that I cannot answer. I do not know. 

Q. In your judgment do you think it necessary for an apothecary to sell 
wines and spirits and to dispense them ? 

A. I certainly do. 

Q. Do you think it is proper to dispense with the use of them in the 
practice of medicine ? 

A. In my opinion it is not. 

Q. Do you mean mixed or unmixed ; that is, in prescriptions or in admin- 
istering generally, they are sold to be used by themselves ? 

A. I am in the habit of prescribing wines' and spirits for medicines, and for 
officinal articles. 

Q. What is your opinion as to the necessity of apothecaries furnishing 
these wines ? 

A. In my opinion it is absolutely necessary that an apothecary should 
have these wines. 

Q. Do you suppose that the prescriptions of physicians could be prepared 
by the apothecaries without the liberty of using these articles ? What is your 
opinion of that ? 

A. My opinion is that they could not be properly prepared by the liquor 
furnished by the agents. 

Q. Is that general opinion ? 



870 APPENDIX. 

A. I could not answer. 

Q. The apothecaries then furnish you with good articles of this kind ? 

A. When they do not, I send them back. 

Q. Have you anything to show the proportion of wines that you use, that 
the apothecaries furnish, as compared with those that are furnished by fami- 
lies ? The question is, if you want to use wines or spirits in private practice, 
whether you give your directions to the families to use so much of wines and 
spirits, letting them get the articles where they have a mind to, or whether 
you send to an apothecary ? 

A. I do both ways. When I am prescribing in a family where I have 
every reason to believe that they keep good wines and spirits, and I think it 
necessary that the patient should have good wine or good spirit, I direct them 
what to give ; but if I have occasion to know that they are not in the habit 
of having good wines or good spirits, I am in the habit of sending them to an 
apothecary, if I know of a good one in the vicinity that I can rely upon, or I 
send them to a wholesale dealer down town. For example, I have been in 
the habit of writing for particular articles with directions that they should be 
mixed with brandy or whiskey or gin, if you please, and in some families I 
would order them to get the articles already mixed — being always in the habit 
of giving written directions, and not directions by word of mouth. 

Q. You practise in some families where there is more or less difficulty or 
inconvenience for them to get the liquors, and where it is impossible, and 
where it is absolutely necessary that an apothecary should furnish them 
with the medicine ? 

A. I do, in a great many such families ; I have done that thing within a 
few weeks, and I have had a child under my care, not six years of age, who 
for a fortnight I think took nothing but brandy and water, and at the rate of 
half a pint of brandy a day, and it was all that kept the child alive. It was 
all that it would take. It was given as a medicine and food. He then got 
tired of it and took it in the form of milk punch, and finally the child got 
tired of that, and refused to take it altogether. Notwithstanding the state- 
ments which have been made on this stand, I think that almost all persons, 
to whom wines and spirits are prescribed as medicine, get disgusted with the 
articles sooner or later, and do not take them at all. I have known that to 
be the case over and over and over again. 

Q. You do not think that it induces a habit of using these articles as a 
drink ? 

A. I think it is a very common thing for people to attribute to the 
physician the habit of drinking that they have formed ; but my own impres- 
sion is that, so far as my observation goes, those who have begun to take these 
medicines get tired and disgusted with them precisely as they are disgusted 
with castor oil and senna tea. 

Q. The amount of wines and liquors used in medicine, have you any 
idea of the proportion they bear to other medicines ? Should you think it 
was as much as half, or as much as ten per cent., or how ? What would be 
the average amount of spirits used among the medical profession ? What 
proportion does it bear to other medicines ? 



APPENDIX. 871 

A. I know nothing about anybody's else practice. There is not a day 
passes when I do not prescribe some kind of wine or spirit, in some form or 
other; sometimes simply in the form of wine or spirit, sometimes in the 
form of a tincture, and sometimes to be mixed with other articles, and 
possibly it is given sometimes in the form of ale or cider or porter. 

Q. Is it used extensively in the Hospital ? 

A . It is used, I have no doubt, very extensively there. There is probably not 
a day passes but that it is used, either in the form of brandy or ale or porter 
or gin or some other preparation. Thore is not a day passes that I do not pre- 
scribe it for some one myself. I have at the present time, somewhere in the 
neighborhood of forty surgical patients. My impressson is that out of that 
number there are those who are taking New England rum, and there may be 
some more who are taking ale. There may be six who are taking New 
England runi, and there may be as many more who are taking ale. I do not 
think I am giving any patient brandy at the present time. I prefer rum for 
the reason that I should feel more confident that they would get good rum. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) You make a remark that if you were in the 
neighborhood of a good apothecary you would send to such an apothecary as 
you could trust. There are apothecaries then, I take it, whom you would 
not like to send to ? 

A. There certainly are, sir. 

Q. How many apothecaries do you think there are in the city of Boston 
whom you would rely upon ? 

A. I could not give you an answer in numbers; but if the apothecaries 
were enabled to carry out the plans which I understand they have for years 
been attempting to carry out, and prevent any one from coming into the 
business who is not competent as a pharmaceutist, it would not be too many 
to license them all. 

Q. About how many would there be likely to be ? 

A. I could not tell you anything about it. I should make provision that 
every profession should be properly guarded in this respect, and I understand 
that the apothecaries have been endeavoring to restrict from selling as apoth- 
ecaries all those who are not competent to perform the duties of an apoth- 
ecary ; and if they are not fit to do that they are not fit to carry on any other 
department of business in connection with this, as important as the dispensing 
of liquor. 

Q. You are aware, are you not, that the city authorities may appoint as 
many apothecaries to sell as they please ? 

A. I do not know anything about it, they are changing the law so often. 

Q. Have you any idea how many apothecaries there are in Boston ? 

A. I could not tell. 

Testimony of Henry W. Lincoln. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You are Secretary of the Massachusetts College 
of Pharmacy ? 

A. lam, sir. 

Q. You have looked at this law, and you understand the meaning of pure 
alcohol. Let me ask you what your understanding of the law is in relation 



872 APPENDIX. 

to your permission to sell under the law ? The law states that druggists may- 
sell to other druggists and to apothecaries and physicians, pure alcohol, and 
that only. Now what is your idea about that ? What is your understanding 
of pure alcohol ? 

A . Do you ask what it is chemically, without any mixture of water ? 

Q. Do your books tell you that that is pure alcohol ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do ycu know whether the law meant it to be pure alcohol or not ? 

A. I do not, sir. I presume, sir, however, that the law should be under- 
stood critically. 

Q. Will you state what a druggist is ? 

A. A druggist, by common usage, is a person who buys and sells but does 
not prepare medicines. 

Q. What is an apothecary ? 

A . One who prepares medicines, a pharmaceutist, or a retail seller. In short 
a druggist may be considered as a wholesaler, and an apothecary as a retailer. 
They are entirely different. 

Q. Your idea is that an apothecary has no right to sell to any one ? 

A. According to the law he has not. 

Q. That is your understanding of it ? 

A. Yes, sir; as I understand the law. 

Q. He has then no right to sell to a physician ? 

A. No, sir ; nor to sell to a brother apothecary 

Q. Now as to the wines that you have to use. I take it that you consider 
it a necessary part of your business to dispense them with medicines. Do 
you think that the demand on the apothecary is imperative to furnish these 
wines and liquors ? 

A. As necessary as any article that we have. 

Q. Do you think that an apothecary can properly answer the necessary 
calls made on him without being enabled to furnish wines and spirits ? 

A. I do not see where he can draw the line in a critical consideration of 
the law. 

Q. Have you any idea when the article ceases to be a drug and becomes 
an intoxicating drink ? I suppose that you consider the article as a scientific 
preparation. Where is the dividing line where it ceases to be wine and 
becomes a drug, under this law ? It says mixed and unmixed. Can you divide 
them ? What should you do with red lavender ? Is not that a prescrip- 
tion that a person may get in such a quantity, that he may obtain a large 
amount of alcohol from it ? 

A. Certainly. 

Q. Do you understand that the law is so considered that you cannot sell 
lavender ? 

A. I think it might be understood so. 

Q. How many articles would you have to dispense, if you should attempt 
to draw the line into the preparation of these articles, when the dividing line 
is so confused that you cannot determine it with precision ? Did you ever 
know anybody to get intoxicated on cologne water ? 



APPENDIX. 873 

A. No, sir; I have heard of it ; but it has never come under my obser- 
vation. 

Q. How is it with tincture of gentian ? , 

A. That is another article that contains alcohol, and also a small propor- 
tion of opium, and might be used on that account. 

Q. And that is, as an intoxicating beverage ? 

A. Certainly it might. I have often been troubled in regard to drawing 
the dividing line in regard to these articles. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) You understand the provision in the statutes in 
regard to the authority in cities and towns to appoint agents. Why does not 
that meet your case ? 

A. The difficulty is that we are obliged to keep a different set of books, 
and keep accounts of every article that we buy and sell, and we are also 
obliged to buy of the State Agent every article that we want. 

Q. Why is that not sufficient ? What trouble is there about that ? • 

A. The general opinion is, that a person can do better. 

Q. In what respect, better ? 

A. By supplying our customers with an article that we can rely upon. 

Q. How long have you been a practising apothecary ? 

A. Twenty years. 

Q. And you have been in the habit of purchasing the wines that you use 
for physicians' prescriptions of the wholesale dealers, and have been in the 
habit of retailing simply for medicinal purposes V 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now you think that you could not supply yourself as well from the 
State Agency ? 

A . I could not tell, sir, until I tried. 

Q. Have you ever tried ? 

A. I have not tried ; but it would be the general opinion, as it has been 
expressed, that we could do better, and I do not know of an agent appointed 
in Boston. I do not know whether there are any sub-agents in Boston * and I 
presume I could not buy of the State Commissioner. 

Q. Should you be willing as an apothecary to go into the business of 
selling as town agent ? 

A. I should not, myself, under the present state of things in Boston. 

Q. Is that the only trouble the apothecaries complain of ? 

A. That is one of the troubles. 

Q. (By Mr. Avery.) Would your duty, as an apothecary, combining 
medicines, interfere with your duties as a town agent ? 

A . It would very much. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Would there, or not, be many cases, supposing 
that you were acting as an apothecary, and doing a general business, and also 
acting as general agent in the city of Boston, in which it would be impossible 
for you to tell whether you ought to make your record of a given prescription, 
on your private books, or on your public agency books ? 

A. It would be very difficult; as difficult as it would be to draw the line 
between those who are intoxicated, and those who are not. 
110 



874 APPENDIX. 

Q. (By Mr. Avery.) As an apothecary, is it not a custom for you to 
receive prescriptions for wines in their simple state, uncombined with medi- 
•cines, and also other alcoholic combinations, and as you consider the law, and 
as the letter of the law reads, you do not feel yourself at liberty to comply 
with these prescriptions except in violation of the law ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Supposing that you make a purchase of a town 
agent of an article of brandy or champagne, and it turns out to be impure or 
defective, do you understand that you have a reclamation on the State, or 
any right to action against the agent ? 

A. I have not examined the law sufficiently to know. 

Q. That would be something of importance, would it not ? When you 
make purchases you rely something upon the personal responsibility or the 
business honor of the man of whom you purchase ? 

A. «Yes, sir; certainly I do; on the same ground as any other articles, 
where if you do not like them you can return them. 

Q. (By Mr. Avery.) How long have you been an apothecary ? 

A. Twenty years, or more. 

Q. You say you never have tried to conform with this law ? 

A. That is the inference that would be drawn, I suppose, from my 
testimony. 

Q. You say that you never asked for an appointment from the Mayor and 
Aldermen ? 

A. I never have. 

Q. In short you have made no attempt to prosecute your business in 
conformity with this law ? 

A. The reason, I have stated. 

Q. What per cent, of your business has to do with spirits and alcohol ? 
Of all your sales what proportion comes under the class of spirituous and 
intoxicating liquors ? 

A. Well, I can hardly tell. It is an estimate that I had not thought of 
making, but I think it would range between ten and twenty per cent. It 
would fall short of the highest and would overrun the lowest. 

Q. Now, when you use spirituous liquor in combining medicines, after it 
has entered into combination, you give that as some other article ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Has it not lost, then, its essential character ? 

A. Its character is changed, but it contains spirituous liquor. 

Q. You take the spirituous liquor and combine it, so that the liquor becomes 
solid ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you think there is no violation of law in selling that solid com- 
pound ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. If you take spirituous liquor and make cologne water, has the article 
not lost its distinctive character ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you think that you cannot sell cologne water ? 



APPENDIX. 875 

A. I think that if the law is not interpreted strictly you can. 

Q. After putting the view upon it that you have, do you think that you 
would not be at liberty to sell a bottle of cologne water ? 

A. I do. You speak of a compound of alcohol in a solid state. In that 
state the alcohol has wholly evaporated, of course. Then it has lost its dis- 
tinctive character ; but it is different with cologne water. It has more alcohol 
than almost any other article we sell. I might say that it contains more than 
any article that we sell, and in fact it is sometimes used for intoxicating 
purposes. 

Q. You also have a class of articles called tinctures ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Into which these intoxicating liquors are put, which are strictly medi- 
cinal. You do not call them in any degree intoxicating then, do you ? 

A. Yes, sir, when they contain spirituous liquors. 

Testimony of James L. Hunt. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) Are you an apothecary ? 

A. I am. 

Q. For how long have you been ? 

A. Eighteen years. 

Q. Your residence is in Hingham ? 

A. It is. 

Q. Have you been an agent for the sale of liquor in Hingham at any 
time? 

A. I have. 

Q. What induced you to accept the agency ? 

A. The expectation that I might furnish liquor for medicinal purposes in 
connection with my other business. 

Q. You conceived it then to be your duty as an apothecary in furnishing 
the citizens of Hingham with other medicines, to sell also spirituous liquors ? 

A. I did. 

Q. Do you think an apothecary can properly perform the duties of his 
profession unless he is permitted to furnish wines and spirits ? 

A. I did not say so ; but he cannot perform all his duties. 

Q. As a town agent, and having a knowledge of this subject, do you 
think that apothecaries in Massachusetts and apothecaries in general are a 
reliable class to whom to intrust the sale of liquors as medicines ? 

A. My knowledge of that class is rather limited, but I am decidedly of the 
opinion that they are a proper class. 

Q. You say that the apothecary business could not be properly carried on 
without the selling of wines and spirits, and therefore you accepted the agency 
at that time ? 

.4. That is the reason, and the only reason why I accepted it. 

Q. If you could be permitted as an apothecary to furnish wines and spirits 
for medicines and mechanical purposes and for the arts, would you have 
accepted the agency ? 

A. I would not ; I regard the agency business as rather incompatible with 
my business. 



876 APPENDIX. 

Q. You have to buy your wines and spirits at the State Agency ? 

A. I do. 

Q. I wish to inquire whether the articles which you have procured at the 
State Agency are, in your opinion, fit for medicinal use ? Were they gener- 
ally reliable articles ? 

A. So far as I can judge, I have generally been satisfied; but in a few 
instances the articles that I have obtained there have not quite satisfied me. 

Q. Can you not rely upon the analysis of the State Assayer ? 

A. I do not think it is to be relied upon entirely as to the quality of the 
wines and liquors. 

Q. Do you mean to say that the certificate of the State Assayer, is not a 
sufficient guaranty to you that the liquors you obtain at the State Agency are 
pure and fit for medicinal use ? 

A. I think that the certificate of the State Assayer that they do not con- 
tain any deleterious matter, and in respect to their purity, is sufficient ; but 
there are other qualities to be considered in purchasing liquor. The age, for 
instance, determines the quality. 

Q. Does not the certificate give you the quality on account of age ? 

A. It does not. 

Q. Suppose that you are buying whiskey for medicinal purposes, at the 
State Agency, can you go there and obtain almost any quality of whiskey 
that you want ? 

A. We can ; and I understand them to be pure, so far as not containing 
any deleterious matter is concerned. 

Q. The usual deleterious article in whiskey is fusel oil. Do you under- 
stand the analysis to say whether the whiskey does or does not contain any 
fusel oil V 

A. The statistics show that. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) How is the purchaser of liquor to find out 
whether it is pure or not ? 

A. In the remark I made about the certificate of the State Assayer, I do 
not mean to be understood as saying that it did not show the purity of the 
article ; but I suppose that most every one knows that unripe whiskey is unfit 
for medical purposes. 

Q. How is a purchaser to know whether the article of whiskey which he 
buys is a good whiskey, in a medical sense ; or, on the other hand, if unripe 
whiskey is unfit for medicine, how can a purchaser determine when purchas- 
ing liquor of the State Commissioner, whether the whiskey he gets is ripe or 
unripe ? 

A. I could not give you any scientific rule to go by. lean only judge 
that the article is old or new. 

Q. You mean that as a trained and educated pharmaceutist you can form 
a judgment as to the ripeness of an article ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. But how are ignorant and untrained people, who go with a physician's 
certificate to the town agent to procure whiskey, to know anything about the 
article that we get ? Is there any test which we can apply, and by which we 



APPENDIX. 877 

may know whether we are buying a good medicinal article or not, or must 
we trust to the town agent as if he were an apothecary ? 

A . Very much depends upon that. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) Do you say that you can go and buy whiskey 
from the dollar-and-a-half whiskey to the six dollar article ? > 

A. I have not heard of whiskey at so low a price as a dollar and a half. 

Q. But you can get any quality of whiskey that you want ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And all the whiskeys that you obtain at the State Agency are accom- 
panied by the chemist's certificate that they are pure ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is the same true of the wines and brandies ? Can you go to the State 
Agency as to any liquor store and buy any quality of brandy or wine that 
you want ? 

A. I suppose that they keep none but what they consider suitable for 
medicinal purposes. 

Q. I am not speaking about what they consider. The price covers the 
quality, does it not, to some extent ? 

A. They keep different prices of brandy. 

Q (By Mr. Andrew.) Is there any way in which the public, when they 
go to the State or town agent to purchase liquor, can know that they are 
obtaining a proper article for medicinal use ? 

A. I cannot answer that question. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) As an apothecary, you have your customers who 
go to your store for articles of medicine ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. Then, as a State Agent, you have a lot of customers who come there 
for all sorts of purposes ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. In the calls for those articles, which you sell as a State Agent, is there 
a demand for low-priced whiskey for mechanical purposes and for the arts ? 

A. Yes. 

Q. And you have occasion to refuse those people a great many times ? 

A. I refuse them when I think there is a just cause for refusal. 

Q. As an apothecary and town agent, is there any law by which you are 
compelled to supply a man with the articles for which he asks when you have 
reason to suppose that he wants them for intoxicating purposes ? Have you 
the right to refuse to sell to him when he states that he wants them for 
mechanical purposes ? 

A. I could not state the law upon the subject. 

Q. Are you obliged to take the testimony of a man as to the purpose for 
which he wants the liquor ? 

A. I exercise my own discretion in selling. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) Do you not' know that the State Assayer can 
determine by his analysis the impurity as well as the purity of an article ? 

A. In the articles that I have received from him or which I have had 
analyzed by him, the impurity is generally stated. 



878 APPENDIX. 

Q. So that he can satisfy you as to the impurity of liquor as well as its 
purity? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. For how long have you been a town agent ? 

A. From eight to ten years. 

Q. In the same place ? 

A, Yes, sir. 

Q. What is the practical difficulty in carrying on the town agency at the 
same time with your general business as an apothecary ? 

A. I think it tends to divert the mind. 

Q. I want you to state the practical difficulties ? 

A. I will state them. It is practically certain that if a man is engaged in 
putting up a very concentrated poison, the practical difficulty would be that 
he would be interrupted by those who wanted to purchase liquors. Tha^ is 
one difficulty. Another objection is that we have to keep two sets of books 
instead of one. We are compelled by law to keep a separate set of books 
containing the accounts of the liquor sold. 

Q. Are there any other difficulties ? 

A. Those are the principal ones. 

Q. Are you not just as much disturbed when you are putting up your 
concentrated poison by parties who come in with prescriptions from the 
physicians for anything else beside liquor. Would not any other call disturb 
you just as much as a call for liquor ? 

A. I think not. 

Q. Would it not if you had to turn away from your business and put up 
another kind of medicine than the one that you are engaged in preparing ? 

A, It would not disturb me so much. 

Q. It would then really disturb you more to furnish a pint of gin than to 
put up another kind of medicine ? 

A. It would. 

Q. Why? 

A. For one thing I have to leave the room to get the gin. I should not 
keep the liquor in the room with my other preparations, and the getting of 
liquor would involve considerable manual labor. If a prescription of a physi- 
cian for instance was for four ounces of wine I would take it from a shelf 
near by. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) Do you receive a salary ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is your salary ? 

A. One hundred dollars. 

Q. Is that salary the only compensation that you get for any amount of 
sale that you make ? 

A. It is. 

Q. Then all the sales that you make as town agent are made without an 
opportunity to get the same compensation that you would receive by way of 
profit, if you sold them in your regular business as an apothecary ? 

A. I make no profit on the liquors. Instructions are given me to furnish 
articles at as low a price as will be sufficient to cover the expense. 



APPENDIX. 879 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) Do you consider that apothecaries are as 
well qualified for the position of town or State agent as any other class of 
persons ? 

A. If I was not one of them, I should think them better qualified than 
any other class. They would certainly be as well qualified as any other. 

Testimony of William T. Rand. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You were formerly an apothecary were you 
not? 

A. I was. 

Q. Where were you in business ? 

A. In Dedham. 

Q. For how long have you been an apothecary ? 

A. About twenty-three years, including my apprenticeship. 

Q. You went out of business in Dedham ? 

A. Yes, sir. I closed up and sold out. 

Q. Will you please state to the Committee why you left the drug business ? 
I understand that you left it for some cause connected with the business. 

A. I had been in Dedham about a year when the law was passed that 
liquor should be sold only by agents ; that each town should appoint an 
agent under the restrictions of the law, and the agency was offered to me ; 
but the restrictions imposed by the law were such that I could not accept it. 
It would interfere too much with my general business as an apothecary. I 
declined to take it on account of the restrictions that were imposed upon the 
sale of liquor. The agents were required by the statute to take the date of 
the sale and the name of the party purchasing ; and as I was so little 
acquainted with the citizens that I should have been obliged to ask them their 
names, I objected to taking it, and notified the selectmen that when they did 
appoint an agent I would cease the selling of liquor as a medicine. They 
neglected to appoint an agent, and I continued selling liquor, using the same 
discretion that I should in selling opium or arsenic, and endeavoring to be 
posted up and to know who would be safe persons to sell to and who unsafe. 
Being a stranger there, I was more liable to be imposed upon ; but after 
using all the precaution that I could in my sales I was prosecuted ; and I felt 
then that if I could not carry on my legitimate business that I had been 
following for twenty-three years, and selling all articles of medicine without 
restriction when called for upon the prescription of a physician, I would 
relinquish the business, for I could not continue it without violating the laws 
of the Commonwealth. 

Q. Do you consider that you could not continue the business of an apoth- 
ecary without being obliged to dispense those articles ? 

A. I do. I have got up at midnight to dispense that article alone. 

Q. And that is the reason why you left the business ? 

A. It is. 

Q. Do you look upon the apothecaries as they run, as being a class reliable 
enough to be intrusted with the sale of spirituous liquors ? 

A. I do. 



880 APPENDIX. 

Q. Do you consider that a provision of the law allowing apothecaries to 
sell would be a proper one ? 

A. I do. 

Q. Do you think that there would be any advantage taken of the privi- 
lege ? 

A. I do not. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) I understand you say that you did not feel that it 
was compatible for you, in your business as an apothecary to attempt to 
comply with the restrictions imposed upon you as an agent ? 

A. It was not. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Do you say that you have given up the apothe- 
cary business in Dedhain ? * 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Are there any apothecaries there now ? 

A. There are. 

Q. Are any of them agents ? 

A. I do not know. 

Q. Do you know that apothecaries are very generally throughout the 
country appointed as agents ? 

A. I do not know that they are. 

Q. If, when you gave up the business, there had been no apothecary left, 
and if, when any one re-opened the business, he must do it upon the condition 
of taking the town agency, do you suppose that any one would refuse to open 
an apothecary shop because that condition was imposed ? 

A. I do not know. The compensation was only fifty dollars. 

Q. Do you understand that apothecaries were usually prosecuted for 
violating the law ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not. 

Q. Did you ever hear of a man being prosecuted for selling mixtures m 
which alcohol was a constituent ? 

A. No, sir. 

Testimony of Charles C. Bixby. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You are an apothecary in North Bridgewater ? 

A. I am. 

Q. For how long have you been an apothecary there ? 

A . Fifteen years. 

Q. You have had occasion to sell wines and spirits, and you believe the 
sale necessary in the apothecary's business, do you not ? 

A. I do not think that he can do justice to his business without selling 
them. 

Q. Have you had any trouble in Bridgewater about selling ? Have you 
been prosecuted or arrested for making sales in your business ? 

A. I have been arrested and prosecuted. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) For doing what ? 

A. Perhaps I should say that previous to the prosecution, the grocers in 
our town bought and sold a quantity of Spear's Sambucci or elderberry wine. 
The agent or manufacturer himself came to our place to sell us some, and we 



APPENDIX. 881 

refused to buy, because we were not allowed to sell it under the law. He sold, 
however, to nearly every grocer in town, and they kept and sold it for some 
time. After some time, and finding that no fault was found with them for sell- 
ing the article, I supposed there would be no objection offered to my selling a 
superior article of wine. I accordingly purchased and did sell, in moderate 
quantities, some California wine. The matter ran along a year or two, and 
then notico was given both to the grocers and to myself — the usual notice, I 
presume — notifying us to stop the sale of such articles. I did so and I sup- 
posed that the others did. I will state, however, that during this time I had 
sold alcohol in limited quantities for medicinal and mechanical purposes, but I 
did not keep any kind of liquor upon draft. This notice was left with me 
about the 9th of March, 1866, and I at once discontinued the sale of every- 
thing of the kind. Some weeks elapsed, and I supposed that the matter had 
ended, when a writ was issued and served for me to appear before the justice 
for selling liquor contrary to law. I appeared before the justice on the after- 
noon of the same day, and found there a number of witnesses, perhaps a 
dozen, who were summoned to testify against me. They were put upon the 
stand, and out of that number three testified to having bought liquor of me, 
not, however, after the notice was given me to stop selling, but previous to 
that time. The first witness testified to having bought whiskey for medicinal 
purposes, his family being sick at the time. He was a temperate man, and a 
man very much esteemed in the town. He bought it for medicinal purposes 
and so stated at the trial, and for that purpose only ; but a few days since I 
was informed that most of the whiskey was still in his house. Another witness 
was our town clerk. He came to me under peculiar circumstances. I might 
say under extraordinary circumstances. His daughter was sick, and her 
attending physician ordered him to procure a certain kind of wine. I think 
it was Muscatel or Angelica, a California wine. He went to the town agent 
to procure it, but the town agent did not keep it. He returned home suppos- 
ing that he must send to Boston for it. The physician came in the morning and 
inquired if he had obtained the wine that he had ordered the patient to take. 
He replied that he had not, because they did not keep it at the agency. The 
doctor said that his daughter must have it and have it immediately, and said 
that he wanted him to go over to Mr. Bixby's and tell him that if he had that 
wine. he must let him have it. The man came over to my store, and told me 
the circumstances, and I let him have the wine. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) Did this lady live or die ? 

A. She died a day or two after.' 

Q. It was then an urgent case, and it was necessary that she should have 
it? 

A. It was so represented to me. The other witness Avas a jeweller to 
whom I had sold alcohol for mechanical purposes. This was all the evidence 
that was produced, and was the evidence upon which I was convicted for 
violating the law. 

Q. Were you fined ? 

A. I was fined fifty dollars and costs. I appealed from the justice's 
decision. The case did not go to trial. My counsel carried it before the 
judge and stated the evidence to him, and the case was disposed of at once by 
111 



882 APPENDIX. 

paying the fine which the State provides, and which the judge could not, of 
course, remit. 

Q. You consider it necessary as a part of the apothecary business to dis- 
pense wines and spirits, and that it is hardly possible to do business without 
doing it ? 

A. I do consider it very necessary that he should be allowed to dispense, 
and I consider that it is right and proper to be done. 

Q. Why were you not appointed agent of North Bridgewater ? 

A. I could not tell you that. 

Q. Would you have accepted an appointment ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Moese.) Why not ? 

A. Because I consider that, as the business was required to be conducted 
under the statute, it would make entirely a separate business from keeping an 
apothecary store. 

Q. Did you feel that it would injure your business as an apothecary ? 

A . I am not accustomed to do business in the way required by the law. 
It would involve a great deal of difficulty in the keeping of two sets of books. 

Q. As an apothecary, have you any feeling of this kind, — that you ought 
not to be obliged to apply to the selectmen for liberty to carry on what you 
consider to be your legitimate business ? 

A. I think that I am very free from that kind of feeling. 

Q. Do you know that any apothecaries have that kind of feeling ? 

A . I do not. 

Q. Is there any apothecary acting as agent in your town ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Is there any town agent there? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What is his business ? 

A. I can hardly answer that question. I think, however, he is in some 
kind of business in this building at the present time. Perhaps a clerk in some 
of the departments. The agency has generally been kept in some shoe-shop, 
or some place of that kind. 

Q. Is the town agent of your town competent to put up medical prescrip- 
tions ? 

A . I should hardly think that he was. It has never been a part of his 
business at all. The town agent's office is now comparatively central to what 
it has been, although it is still much further from the centre of population 
than most places of business. It is at the agent's residence. 

Q. Can you "give us any idea of the profit that is made upon wines and 
spirits sold by apothecaries ? 

A. No, sir ; I do not think that I could. 

Q. It is a matter of profit ? 

A . I think not. I should think nothing of selling them in that point of 
view. 

Q. Do you know what class of persons are town agents in the towns in 
your neighborhood ? 

A. No, sir ; I am not personally acquainted with any of the agents. 



APPENDIX. 883 

Q. But do you not know who they are and what class of men they are ? 

A. I do not now remember of an apothecary in our vicinity having been 
appointed as agent. 

Q. Do you know whether or not there, is a general feeling among the 
apothecaries against acting as town agents ? 

A. So for as I know, they do object to acting as town agents under the 
present restrictions of the law. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldricii.) Are there any other apothecary shops in your 
town except yours ? 

A. There are. 

Q. Did any of your profession ever apply for the agency ? 

A. Not that I know of. 

Q. Did you decline to take it ? 

A, I have never been applied to to take it; but I should decline taking it 
if I was. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that you were prosecuted for selling a 
bottle of California wine, in an extraordinary case of sickness ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I have stated the facts in regard to that prosecution. 

Q. Had you not sold other wines at other times ? 

A. I said that I had. I said that I had bought California wines previous 
to that time, at the time that the grocers bought Sambucci wine. 

Q. Have you sold any other kind of spirituous liquors ? 

A. I had sold alcohol. 

Q. Have you sold brandy ? 

A. I do not know that I shall answer that. 

Q. Have you sold any liquors except for medicinal or mechanical pur- 
poses ? 

A. No, sir; I have always endeavored to conform with the spirit of the 
law, and never to sell except for medicinal or other proper purposes ; and in 
selling have always used what discretion I could. 

Q. Do you consider it conforming to the spirit of the law to sell a bottle 
of wine contrary to the law for medicinal purposes ? 

A . I think it would have been morally right for any man to have sold it 
under those circumstances. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) For how long have you been an apothecary ? 

A. For fifteen years. 

Q. Are you willing to say that you have not sold intoxicating liquor a 
thousand different times within the last ten years ? 

A. Yes, sir, I am ; unless it be in some combined form. 

Q. I ask you in regard to intoxicating liquor uncombined. 

A. No, sir ; I have not. 

Q. Are you willing now, upon your honor as a man, to say that you have 
not sold intoxicating liquor a thousand times within the last ten years ? 

A. I say at once that I do not think I have. 

Testimony of J. L. Hunt, (continued.) 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) Before you were town agent, you were aa 
apothecary in Hingham, and had been for many years? 



884 APPENDIX. 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Before you were town agent in Hingliam, were you ever prosecuted 
for selling alcoholic liquids ? 

A. Quite a number of years ago, we were prosecuted upon two counts. 
One was that we sold some bay rum upon the prescription of Dr. Fiske ; the 
other was that we sold directly to a physician, Dr. Underwood (he so testified 
in court), a gill of alcohol. He testified in court that the use to which he put 
it, was for bathing his wife's foot, for the rheumatism or some other complaint. 
I was prosecuted. One sale was on the written prescription of a physician, 
and the other was, as I have stated, a sale to the Doctor himself. 

Q. (By Mr. McClellan.) How long ago was that ? 

A. About eighteen years ago ; it was before this present law. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You stated that it would disturb you in your 
preparations of other medicines to sell spirits or a bottle of wine, but still you 
sold it ? 

A. I will state, what I should have stated before, what occurs to me to be 
the greatest objection to acting as town agent for the sale of liquor. If a 
person calls for the tincture of rhubarb, I know that I can go right along and 
put it up ; but if the call is for a pint of rum, there are some questions that 
must be asked before I can sell it. I must know who the man is, and what 
he wants the rum for, and must be satisfied that he wants it for medicinal 
purposes, before I can sell it; and such inquiries I think are out of place in 
an apothecary shop. 

Q. If you are an apothecary, and have the right to sell for medicinal 
purposes, do you not have to go through the same investigation ? 

A. * Perhaps to some extent an investigation would be required, but still, 
it being my own business, I would be more at liberty in the matter. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) Do I understand that you came here as a witness 
entirely independent of the cause of license or prohibition, and simply in the 
interest of your professional business ? 

A. I came here in obedience to a summons from the Chairman of the Com- 
mittee, not knowing what questions would be asked me. 

Q. Since you came here, have you been in communication with the coun- 
sel upon either side ? 

A. I have not. 

Q. How does it happen that the details of your experience are known to 
the counsel upon one side ? 

A. I suppose that I have mentioned what I have said to some friends. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooxer.) Do you sell opium ? 

A, I do. 

Q. Do you sell arsenic ? 

A. I do once in a while. 

Q. Have you not several articles in your shop that are termed poison ? 

A. I have. 

Q. Do you always make a record of what you sell ? 

A . I do of those articles enumerated in the statute. 

Q. Does making that record disturb you very much ? 

A. No, sir ; it is in my line of business. 



APPENDIX. 885 

Testimony of Sampson Heed. 
Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You have been a retail apothecary and whole- 
sale druggist in the city of Boston for many years ? 

A. I have. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) How many years ? 

A. As retail seller from 1824, about seven or eight years, and as a whole- 
sale druggist from that time to 1860. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You know the character of the apothecaries in 
the city as well as in the country. Should you judge that the apothecaries' 
business could be properly prosecuted under this law ? 

A. I should not suppose it could be. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) I should like to inquire whether there is any diffi- 
culty in your opinion, and if so, what it is, in apothecaries becoming town 
agents, and doing that part of the business which requires them to sell wines 
and spirits ? 

A. I should suppose that the two things were quite incompatible with 
each other. I should think it would certainly be so in the city of Boston, and 
I should suppose it would be so in the country. I would state that for many 
years after I was in business as an apothecary, it was most an unknown thing' 
for apothecaries to be called upon for spirits of any kind ; but when the tem- 
perance movement began, a change took place ; spirits and wines seemed to 
be associated in the minds of the public, especially in the minds of temper- 
ance men, with medicines, and the apothecaries and druggists began to be 
called upon for that class of articles ; and I think it has continued so since. 
It has always seemed to me that the fact which led to this call on the apothe- 
caries and druggists for this class of articles, originated in the temperance 
movement. I think if they could be permitted to supply this call, it would 
promote the movement. It is calculated to associate this article in the minds 
of the public with medicine. 

Q. Do you regard it as adding strongly to the prohibitory law to allow 
apothecaries to sell wines and spirits ? 

A . I should think it would help the cause of temperance if they should sell 
it ; that is, there should be suitable apothecaries, of course. There should be 
some way to determine that they are competent for the position. 

Q. If they were to be qualified for this duty without anything else, it 
would be sufficient you would think ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) If the apothecaries could be licensed, what 
would you have them licensed for ? 

A. For the purposes that are prescribed in the law. 

Q. I mean laying aside that for a moment ; what should you think the 
proper uses to be for which they should be authorized to sell, — medicine or 
anything ? 

A. I see no reason why they should not be licensed to sell for medicinal 
and mechanical and manufacturing purposes. 

Q. You would not have them authorized to sell as a beverage ? 

A. Oh no, sir. 



886 APPENDIX. 

Q. Under the present law, they are authorized to sell for medicinal, 
mechanical, and manufacturing purposes ; now is there anything to make that 
business any more difficult to be qualified for than the general business of the 
apothecary ? 

A . I think that this law is very perplexing, requiring what cannot be 
kept. It would interfere, I should suppose, with the business of the apoth- 
ecary. 

Q. Is there anything that renders it more so under this law than another ? 

A. I do not think that there is. It would be restricting the apothecary to 
purchase of the general agent or the Commissioner. I think people generally 
desire to purchase where they can get it the cheapest. With the agent 
himself it is no inducement to buy the article cheap. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) You say that until the passage of this law, it was 
not customary for apothecaries to be called upon to furnish liquors so much. 
Is it not from the fact that they have been appointed as town agent in some 
cases ? 

A. I think, since the law was passed, that the people have begun to regard 
it in the light of a medicine, and have naturally looked to the apothecary. 

Testimony of Frank W. Simmons. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You are an apothecary on Washington Street ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been in the business ? 

.4. About twelve years.' 

Q. I believe you are a temperance man, are you not ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you belong to the Sons of Temperance and to other societies ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Being in the legitimate line of an apothecary's business, do you feel 
obliged to dispense wines and spirits in putting up physicians' prescriptions ? 
Is the nature of your business such as to require you to do it ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you have any compunctions about it ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you feel that you can do your business properly, and attend to the 
wants of your business unless you do dispense these articles ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Would you be willing to accept a local agency for the sale of wines 
and spirits? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. What would be your reasons for not accepting ? 

A. The only reason would be that it would, in my opinion, have to be 
conducted in the form of another business. I should have to make a separate 
business of it. 

Q. Should you have to keep a separate set of books? And would it 
interfere with your regular business ? 

A. I should object to it on that account. 

Q. You would as soon mix it up with the grocery business ? 



APPENDIX. 887 

A. I think I should. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) What do you furnish alcoholic preparations for? 

A. Strictly officinal purposes. 

Q. Nothing else ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) Do you sell alcoholic preparations to those who 
call for them ? 

A. I furnish them, always, however, asking the question if they are to be 
used for medicinal purposes. 

Q. Do you sell it when they answer in the negative ? 

A. Sometimes when they have answered in the negative, I have sold it, 
when I have known the parties. 

Q. If it is not for chemical and mechanical purposes you hesitate ? 

A. I have sold it, but I should use my discretion whether I should take a 
man's word or not. 

Q. You would exercise your discretion in any case whether it was for 
medicinal, mechanical or chemical purposes ? You furnish it for all these 
cases, do you not ? 

A. I do, but under restrictions. 

Q. Then you do not sell to everybody ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. If you were appointed an agent, why should you not accept ? 

A. If I were appointed an agent, I should think it would interfere with 
my business ; and that it would take so much attention from my legitimate 
business that I could not attend to it. 

Q. Would mechanics and other classes of people come to you any more 
than now, since you furnish liquors for these same purposes ? 

A. If I were to take an agency, I should think that it would be taken for 
granted by them that I was to furnish them. 

Q. (By Mr. Albrjch.) Is there any greater embarrassment more than 
now, except that you would have to keep two sets of accounts ? 

A. I do not know from practice, but it is my opinion that there would be. 

Q. You feel that it is contrary to the law at present ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How can you, as a good citizen, justify yourself in a sale which you 
and the temperance men believe to be wrong ? 

A. Under the present law, I cannot justify it. I only do it, as I said 
before, for necessary purposes and necessary wants. 

Q. But that is a violation of the law ? 

A. Yes, sir; I stand liable at any time. 

Q. How can you justify yourself in carrying on this business in defiance of 
the law of the land, when by taking an agency you can carry it on ? 

A. I cannot answer that question. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Supposing there was a sub-agent at the next 
door, how would that affect you ? 

A. It would be according to whether they were to sell for mechanical or 
medicinal purposes, I should think. 



888 APPENDIX. 

Q. Suppose you should ask the Mayor and Aldermen to appoint an agent, 
if you do not wish to take it yourself? 

A . The apothecaries do wish to take it, so far as medicinal purposes go. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) In your own regular apothecary's business, you 
wish to do your own business of buying and selling as you please ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is there any inconvenience connected with this business of the agency 
in which you cannot buy and where you cannot sell as you please, being an 
agent in a business, and looking to the profits of your own business,— is there 
that in it that any business man would object to, and all business men, if con- 
nected with the business which he is in at the time ? 

A . I hardly understand that statement so as to answer it. 

Q. Would you connect selling on commission with other business ? 

A. So far as profits go, in that part of the business, I think I had just as 
lief, so far as I am concerned myself; I do not know how it is with other parties. 

Testimony of Isaac T. Campbell. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) Where is your place of business ? 

A. My place of business is in State Street. My store is No. 153 Broad- 
way, South Boston. 

Q. You are drug examiner for the port of Boston ? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q' You have been local agent ? 

A. I have. 

Q. And you are an apothecary in South Boston ? 

A. Yes, sir. Perhaps I should qualify my statement by saying, that the 
Mayor and Aldermen saw fit to honor me with the appointment which, how- 
ever, I did not accept. 

. Q. You have never acted under it ? 

A. I have never acted under it. 

Q. Do you consider that an apothecary, if he was a first-class apothecary, 
could conscientiously act under that agency as a local agency, and be obliged 
to perform his business as an apothecary, as a first-class scientific man ? 

A . I do not. 

Q. It is your judgment that he could not do it ? 

A. I could not. 

Q. Could he furnish himself with any articles that he would want ? 

A . No, sir ; the only reason why I did not accept it was because I imported 
my own wines and brandies. 

Q. Do you consider an analysis of wines and spirits, especially as it is 
guaranteed to be pure from the State Agency, is sufficient guaranty to you or 
the public for furnishing them as medicine to your customers ? 

A. Of a great many liquors it might not. 

Q. Would it be a sufficient guaranty if it were furnished on the certificate 
of the assayer ? 

A. I should take the certificate of the very best chemists. 



APPENDIX. 889 

Q. Do you consider that the chemist's certificate will give you the age and 
flavors of the wines, and will give you the qualities of the wines, including 
all the circumstances connected with them ? 

A. It cannot, sir. 

Q. You have a great many analyses in your regular business ? 

A. I do, as drug-examiner. 

Q. The analysis applied to wine worth two dollars would not apply to 
wine worth eight dollars ? 

A. It would not be the same. 

Q. Is it your judgment that in the examination of spirits, the certificate 
of the State Assayer will give you the amount of fusel oil ? 

A. I understand that it does not. I understand that he gives you an 
analysis showing if there are foreign substances. 

Q. (By Mr, Miner.) I understand you to say that he cannot determine 
the amount of spirit and of sugar ? 

A. He can determine that. 

Q. Did you not say that his certificate was sufficient ? 

A. I did. 

Q. Why do you think that it is not sufficient for your purposes ? 

A . It proves the fact of the purity of the wine, but not the richness. 

Q. Does the richness depend on the amount of the spirit and sugar, and 
the maturity of the wine, with the flavor imparted partly by age and partly 
influenced by the circumstances under which it has been kept, and cannot the 
chemist determine that ? 

A. He cannot. 

Q. Which of them can he not determine ? 

A. He cannot determine the age. 

Q. Can he determine the maturity ? 

A. I think it would be difficult. 

Q. Are you not aware that they are obtained by other circumstances than 
the combination of the elements from which they are prepared ? 

A. I am. 

Q. Is the testimony of a chemist with regard to maturity competent ? 

A. I think not, generally, among wine manufacturers. 

Q. Do you yourself know to the contrary ? Have you any personal 
knowledge ? 

A. Only by taste. 

Testimony of Thomas Hollis. 
Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) You are a druggist and apothecary in Boston ? 
A. ■ Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been in Boston ? 

A. I have been in business now — this will make the fiftieth year. 
Q. When you were first in the business there was very little spirits sold ? 
A. We sold none. 

Q. Then the business has grown up of late ? 
A. It has grown up within a dozen years. 
112 



890 APPENDIX. 

Q. How do you account for the sale getting into the apothecaries' hands 
so much ? 

A. Perhaps in the first place it was on account of prohibitory law that 
there was a general feeling that it better be placed among medicines instead 
of being in the hands of other parties. 

Q. You mean that the temperance men made that law, and it became 
unfashionable to use it, and it naturally went to the apothecaries ? 

A. They would rather prefer to have it in the hands of the apothecaries. 

Q. You think it would be better to have it in such hands than to have it 
in use ? 

A . Mainly for medicinal purposes ; not for beverages : that was one 
reason. Then I think physicians have been in the habit of prescribing within 
the last ten years tenfold more than they did before. 

Q. How do you account for that ? 

A . The idea is that diseases change in their peculiarities, 

Q. Is the idea that there is more need now than formerly ? 

A. I do not know about that. It is a general impression, and late years 
there has been a change in practice. So it is with other medicines. There 
are some articles that we do not sell at all. Take for instance calomel, there 
is not one pound used now where there was ten formerly. For ten years I 
never sold the article of brandy ; but I was obliged to dispense that and to 
sell it because physicians prescribed it. There are persons — I was going to 
say scarcely any person will take a voyage without taking spirit of some 
kind. On board ships, I always put up brandy in medicine chests. I scarcely 
ever put up any without putting a small quantity ; and I have put up a great 
deal of medicine for ministers, missionaries who have gone to foreign countries. 
And I have invariably kept this article during the last ten or fifteen years. I 
think this change began fifteen years ago, and has been gradually increasing. 

Q. Do you think that the apothecary can properly perform the duties of 
his business without dispensing wines and liquors as medicines, and comply 
with the law ? 

A. I do not see how he can comply with it according to the present 
practice of physicians. The physicians have done most of our selling. 

Q. The question has come up here, whether an apothecary could accept 
a sub-agency, under the existing law. Do you think an apothecary could 
properly perform his duties as an apothecary and accept an agency for the 
sale of liquors under the present law ? 

A. I can perhaps answer that question, by telling you what I did myself. 
Soon after the Maine Law was passed, the Mayor and Aldermen had liberty 
to authorize persons to sell ; and persons might apply it for medicinal, chem- 
ical and mechanical purposes. And under that regulation, I applied to the 
Mayor and Aldermen for a license, although I did not sell but very little. I 
only felt that I wanted to comply with the law ; and I applied, and got a 
license without difficulty. They directed me to make a record of all sales 
that I made, and to keep a book for the record, the same as in any business. 
I took the license in good faith. I commenced and purchased what articles 
I wanted as a State agency, and made a record. Some six months after I 
was licensed by the city of Boston, I received a notice that it was not neces- 



APPENDIX. 891 

sary for me to make any returns to the Board, and that I might discontinue 
the record. I still held a license, and found it quite a relief; for it was not a 
very comfortable thing to be obliged to keep a book for separate sales. And 
then all that I purchased, I was obliged to use that in all the tinctures ; and 
I was not allowed to furnish for anybody. I gave up the keeping of this 
record, by the direction of the Board. I took a license for the next year ; 
and the next year after that it seemed to have died out, and the sale of spirits 
became a free thing. There was no let nor license anywhere ; and it was not 
thought that there should be any applications. With regard to the agency, it 
is only a commission on borrowed goods. It is an incumbrance to the apoth- 
ecary to have it, because he cannot, as in the case of the agent from Hingham, 
have the whole sale. He is one of a hundred dealers ; and he is obliged to 
scrutinize every one that comes to him ; and he has very small pay. 

Q. You think that generally the apothecaries would not like to accept ? 

A. It does not yet appear desirable. 

Q. (By Mr. Morse.) You are President of the Massachusetts College of 
Pharmacy ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (By Mr. Avery.) I would ask you whether, as a conscientious and 
intelligent apothecary, as you are, you would not deem it your duty, even if 
there were no law, if any party should come to you, and inquire for liquor, to 
inquire into it ? 

A. I should, sir ; I always have. 

Q. If there were never any law you would do that ? 

A. I should always do it. 

Q. I asked the question as relative to the question as to its being an inter- 
ference with the regular business of the apothecary, to take an agency, 
because it required him to scrutinize those to whom he sold. 

A. It would require the keeping of separate books, and the apothecary 
would constantly have his attention distracted. 

Q. (By Mr. Spooner.) Have the State authority to give any compen- 
sation that they deem proper ? 

A. I do not know how that is now. 

Mr. Baker was recalled by the counsel for the petitioners, and testified 
briefly. 

Testimony of John I. Baker (continued.) 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) How long since you appointed an agent in the city 
of Boston ? 

A . In the month of January last. 

Q. Does he give bonds to the city of Boston ? 

A. He gives bonds to me, sir. 

Q. I wish to know if he buys his liquor of you as the other agents do ? 

A. He buys not exactly as other agents do; he buys directly from my 
stock. The account is kept by me. 

Q. Is his transaction, his purchasing of liquors, the same as that of the 
town agent ? 



892 APPENDIX. 

A. Not exactly ; because he sells, and comes and takes the liquors directly 
from me. 

Q. And it is charged to him ? 

A. It is charged to him in small quantities. 

Q. Where do you get your whiskeys ? You spoke of getting your Med- 
ford rum and alcohol of manufacturers, and your foreign liquors of Foster 
& Taylor. Do you go to this same house for your whiskey ? 

A. To Foster & Taylor. 

Q. It is American whiskey ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. They are not manufacturers ? 

A. They are not manufacturers, sir. I would state my reason, if you will 
allow me. There are no manufacturers here that I know of. I suppose that 
the law is a practical measure. It simply authorizes me to buy and sell. I 
could not have it from Ohio and Kentucky, where it is manufactured, and 
have it analyzed. I must buy under these circumstances. When I went to 
this firm, I asked them if they were ready to sell under the provisions of the 
Act. They said that they had consulted eminent counsel, and that they were 
instructed that they had a right to sell. Under that state of facts, I purchased 
of them. 

Q. You buy without having determined the question whether it is right 
to sell? 

A. It is not for me to determine. 

Q. Do they have an arrangement with any particular house of which they 
get whiskey ? Does it all come from one place ? 

A. Not all from one place; different kinds are from different manufac- 
turers. Some is very high in price, and other kinds are very different 
according to age. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) It was stated in some of the other hearings that you 
sold different qualities of brandies ? 

A. I do, but not 'American brandies. As for selling any American 
brandies, I have not had them, and I have no brandies less than seven dollars 
per gallon. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) You buy in the original package ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And all the American liquors that you buy, you buy of the manu- 
facturers ? 

A. Yes, sir, so far as I can. 

Q. (By Mr. Miner.) I understand it that nobody can legally sell foreign 
liquors here under the present law, unless you buy them in the original pack- 
ages ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. The question is if you can buy it ? 

A. I think the statute contains no provision against buying under the 
circumstances in which we are placed. 

Q. (By Mr. Fay.) Are there apothecaries who are town agents ? 

A. Yes, a large number. I think that all in Worcester are agents, and 
there are quite a number throughout the State. There are also quite a num- 



APPENDIX. 893 

ber at the present time who are making applications to be appointed agents 
in this city. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) Can you name one ? 

A. There is an apothecary in East Boston who has made an application 
for an agency. I have laid these applications on file, because I have not con- 
cluded to appoint. They can be seen at my place of business. 

Q. (By Mr. Child.) Do you buy any other domestic liquors except 
whiskey of anybody else except the manufacturers in less quantities than 
thirty gallons ? 

A. I do not intend to. 

Q. Do you purchase in larger quantities ? 

A. In one instance I bought of another party than the manufacturer. The 
agent in New Bedford called my attention to some new rum which could be 
bought for less than the market value, and stated that he wanted it for his 
uses ; and I bought it. That is the only case that I remember of. 

Q. Do you buy in the original packages ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Any American gin that you buy ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you buy of the manufacturers ? 

A. They purport to be the manufacturers ', I cannot say that they are. 

Q: Have they got a manufactory ? 

A. I do not know it. 

Q. What quantities do you buy ? 

A. In packages of about forty gallons. 

Q. What other American liquors do you buy ? 

A. Nothing else occurs to me now, except as I have testified before. 

Q. (By Mr. Aldrich.) I would inquire whether it is your understanding 
that the agents whom you appoint here have a right to sell to anybody except 
citizens of the city of Boston ? 

A. I do not know of any limitation of the law forbidding them. 

Q. The statute provides as follows : " He shall appoint in the city of Bos- 
ton as many agents, not exceeding five, as he thinks the interests of the 
citizens require." 

A. The law has been so acted upon, as I know in other towns, as to sell to 
parties not of the town. 

Q. (By Mr. Colcord.) Do you rely solely upon analysis for the wines 
and spirits that you purchase ? 

A. No. I rely upon the character of the men of whom I purchase, as 
well as upon analysis. I buy, for instance, a large quantity of Foster & 
Taylor. And I understand that druggists in this city buy largely of them 
also. 

Q. I would inquire whether the liquor that is furnished you from that store 
is furnished solely on the guarantee of your chemist's certificate, or whether 
you use your own sense to determine the quality ? 

A. I have but little- confidence in the test of liquors in this respect, having 
seen as many professed experts deceived. I have seen old dealers years ago 



894 APPENDIX. 

choose American brandy made at $0.40, in preference to that imported at 
$2.50. 

Q. How do you determine the age of wines ? Do you rely solely on the 
analysis to give you these properties ? 

A. Not at all. I regard the analysis, and the confidence I have in the 
parties who sell. 

Q. You do not rely on your own judgment ? 

A. I do not pretend to have any judgment, or, at least, to be an expert. 
I say, as I did the other day, that I have got to purchase somewhere, and that 
I purchase of those parties in whom I have the most confidence. 

Q. (By Mr. Andrew.) You said you had your attention called to a 
quantity of New England rum very cheap. How cheap was it ? 

A. I did not say it was very cheap ; it was under the market price. I 
think it was $2.10, when the market price for Lawrence's rum was $2.50. 

Q. How much do you give per gallon generally for American manufactured 
spirits ? 

A. I give $2.50 at the present time for new rum. 

Q. Do you purchase any whiskey less than $2 ? 

A. Nothing less than $2.75. The $1.50 whiskey of which these gentlemen 
speak they probably know more about than I do. 

Adjourned. 



[The following communication, inserted at the request of the counsel for 
the Petitioners, will explain itself.] 

April 1, 1867. 
Hon. Robert M. Morse, Jr., Chairman, #c, <fc, $c. 

My Dear Sir :— In revising my memoranda, in the preparation of my Argument, I 
find that I probably made the error of confounding Dr. Dalton, with Dr. Gairdner of 
Edinburgh, in my cross-examination of Dr. Bellows. Not having the books before me, 
and not being a man of science (although I had examined Dr. Dalton partially), I confused 
two separate recollections. Will you be kind enough to allow this note, or its substance, 
to be inserted in the proper place, by the Reporter, as a note, and thus correct an inadver- 
tence. Dr. Dalton does not appear to discuss " alcohol," in the edition of his very able 
work at my command. 

I am, very respectfully and obediently, &c, &c, &c, 

JOHN A. ANDREW. 



APPENDIX. 895 



WITNESSES. 



. FOR PETITIONERS. 

Page. 

Adams, John Quincy, Quincy, 302 

Adams, Rev. Nehemiah, D. D., Boston, 165 

Agassiz, Prof. Louis, Cambridge, . . . 280 

Alger, Rev. William R., Boston, Ill 

Andrews, Joseph, Boston, 261 

Bacon, Rev. Leonard, D. D., New Haven, Ct., 356 

Barnard, Rev. Charles F., West Roxbury, 226 

Bigelow, George F., M. D., Boston, 117 

Bigelow, Prof. Henry J., M. D., Boston, 405 

Bishop; Hon. Henry W., Lenox, 59 

Blagden, Rev. George W., D. D., Boston, 113 

Blaisdell, Hon. J. C, Fall River, . . .367 

Bolles, Rev. J. A., D. D., Boston, 102 

Bowen, Prof. Francis, Cambridge, 314 

Brady, Rev. Robert, Boston, 102 

Brewster, Augustus O., Boston, 86 

Brownell, Hon. Oliver M., New Bedford, 336 

Buffington, Hon. Edward R., Fall River, 338 

Burrell, Brig-Gen. Isaac S., Roxbury, . . . 249 

Clark, Rev. B. F., Chelmsford, . 321, 325 

Clarke, Prof. Edward H., M. D., Boston, 384,400,413 

Clifford, Ex.-Gov. John H., New Bedford, . . . . 31 

Cluer, John C, Boston, 214 

Davis, Hon. Charles G., Plymouth, . . . . . . . . . .840 

Derby, E. H., Esq., Boston, . . 205 

Derby, George, M. D., Boston, . . . . . . . . . . .412 

Doherty, Rev. Manassas, Cambridge, 105 

Duncan, Hon. James H, Haverhill, 328 

Eastburn, Right Rev. Manton, D. D., Boston, 269 

Edson, Frank, Hadley, 332 

Edson, Rev. Theodore, D. D., Lowell, 318 

Ellis, Rev. George E., D. D., Charlestown, 276 

Ellis, Rev. Rufus, Boston, 312 

Fassin, Matthew J., New York, 415 

Fay, Hon. Francis B., Lancaster, 299 

French, Hon. Henry F., Cambridge, 170 

Gaffield, Thomas, Boston, . . ' . .219 

Gage, Addison, West Cambridge, 254 

Gillette, Hon. E. B., Westfield, 63,71 

Goodwin, Albert G M Boston, 123 

Hardy, Hon. Alpheus, Boston, . ... 199 

Harris, Hon. Benjamin W., East Bridgewater, ........ 67 



896 APPENDIX. 

Page. 

Hartney, Rev. Michael, Salem, 126 

Haskins, Rev. George F., Boston, 29 

Heal} r , Rev. James A., Boston, 19 

Hedge, Rev. Frederic H., D. D., Brookline, . 306 

Hill, Henry, Braintree, 303 

Hillard, Hon. George S., Boston, . . 50 

Holmes, Prof. Oliver Wendell, M. D., Boston, 401 

Horsford, Prof. E. N., Cambridge, 402 

Hoyt, Capt. David, Deerfield, 381 

Ide, Rev. George B., D. D., Springfield, . . 353 

Jackson, Charles T., M. D., Boston, . . .410 

Jackson, Prof. J. B. S., M. D., Boston, 401 

Jones, Rev. John, Pelham, 345, 352 

Kurtz, John, Boston, 190 

Lambert, Rev. T. R., Charlestown, ; 271 

Lathrop, W. M., Boston, 57 

Lewis, Mayor George, Roxbury, 134 

Lincoln, Hon. Daniel Waldo, Worcester, 350 

Lincoln, Hon. Frederic W., Jr., Boston, 149 

Lincoln, Rev. I. S., Warwick, 257 

Lovejoy, Rev. J. C, Cambridge, 326 

Macy, Hon. Alfred, Nantucket, 295 

Marsh, Henry A., Amherst, 128 

McCleary, Samuel F., Boston, 231 

McMahon, Rev. Lawrence, New Bedford, 103 

Messervey, Hon. William S., Salem, 377 

Neale, Rev. Rollin H., D. D., Boston, 284 

Nichols, Lyman, Boston, 47 

Norcross, Hon. Otis, Boston, 128 

O'Hagan, Rev. J. B., Boston, .125 

Page, P. L., Pittsfield, 374 

Paine, Hon. Henry W., Boston, 180 

Park, Hon. John C, Boston, 172 

Parker, Charles Henry, Boston, 15 

Parker, Hon. Joel, Cambridge, 41 

Patch, Hon. E. B., Lowell, 243 

Peabody, Rev. A. P., D. D., Cambridge, 343 

Perry, Hon. J. H., New Bedford, 335 

Philbrick, Chase, Lawrence, 376 

Pierce, Edward L,, Milton, 251 

Putnam, Rev. George, D. D., Roxbury, 288 

Richardson, Hon. George C, Boston, 142 

Robinson, Rev. John P., Boston, 106 

Russell, Hon. Charles, Princeton, 233 

Russell, Hon. Charles T., Cambridge, 41 

Sanger, Hon. George P., Boston, 71, 77 

Savage, Edward IL, Boston, 236 

Sheahan, Rev. Thomas, Taunton, 101 

Stackpole, Oliver, Boston, 265 

Storer, D. H., M. D., Boston, 410 

Strain, Rev. Patrick, Lynn, 117 

Souchard, Jules E., Boston, 414 

Taylor, Rev. Edward T., Boston, 121 

Tirrell, Minot, Jr., Lynn, 380 

Todd, Rev. John, D. D., Pittsfield, 495 



APPENDIX. 



897 



Todd, Rev. John E., Boston, 
Tracy, Rev. Joseph, D. D., Beverly, . 
Upton, Hon. George B., Boston, . 
Voelckers, Theodore, .... 
Warren, Hon. G. Washington, Charlestown 
Washburn, Ex.-Gov. Emory, Cambridge, 
Wells, Rev. E. M. P., Boston. . 
White, Prof. James C., M. D., Boston, 
Wightman, H. W. B., N. Chelmsford, 
Wightman, Hon. Joseph M., Boston, . 
Worcester, Rev. Thomas, D. D., Boston, 



Pape. 
168 
292 

39 

218 

184 

2 

89 
395 
324 
15T 



FOR REMONSTRANTS. 

Alden, Ebenezer, M. D., Randolph, 768 

Allen, Nathan, M. D., Lowell, 779 

Ames, Hon. Oliver, North Easton, 460 

Baker, Hon. John I., Beverly, 691,891 

Bartlett, Josiah, M. D., Concord, 778 

Bellows, A. J., M. D., Boston, 781, 823 

Boynton, Hon. Nehemiah, Chelsea, 478 

Bursley, David, Barnstable, . . . 849 

Carey, Henry G., Maiden, 805 

Carleton, Rev. George J., Charlestown, . . . . . . . . . 809 

Clapp, Hon. Otis, Boston, 835 

Clark, 0. R., Winchester, 659 

Cleveland, Rev. Charles, Boston, . " . - . . 481 

Cobleigh, Rev. N. E., D. D., Boston, . . .431 

Cochran, Rev. J. G., Buffalo, 680 

Currier, Hon. William E., Newburyport, 825 

Cushing, Andrew, Boston, 613 

Crosby, Hon. Nathan, Lowell, 550 

Davis, Hon. Woodbury, Portland, Me., 726 

Day, Albert, M. D., Boston, 748 

Dennison, T. R., New Bedford, 445 

Dewey, Hon. Charles A., Milford, . 668 

Ellis, Francis D., Boston, 466 

Evans, Hon. Benjamin, Salisbury, 833 

Fairbanks, Mayor George O., Fall River, 587 

Farnsworth, Ezra, Boston, " . . . . 426 

Fox, Hon. William H., Taunton, 644 

Frost, Mayor Rufus S., Chelsea, 603 

Fulton, Rev, J. D., Boston, 508 

Gale, Rev. Nahum, D. D., Lee, . . . 545 

Gannett, Rev. Ezra,. D. D., Boston, 817 

Hanks, Rev. Stedman W., Lowell, 528 

Haven, Rev. Gilbert, Boston, 804 

Hayes, Dr. Augustus A., Boston, 701, 713 

Hodges, Hon. Samuel W., Boston, 625, 629 

Hopkins, Rev. Mark, D. D., Williamstown, . 756 

Jackson, William E., Boston, 600 

Jarvis, Edward, M. D., Dorchester, 866 

Ladd, Hon. John S., Cambridge, 607 

Lewis, G. F.i Cleveland, Ohio, . . 767 



898 APPENDIX. 

Page 

Manning, Rev. Jacob M., Boston, 518, 812 

Marston, Hon. George, Barnstable, .• 663 

Marvin, Rev. E. B., D. D., Boston, 578 

Mellen, Hon. Edward, Wayland, 850, 858 

Mitchell, E. L., Boston, 806 

Olmstead, Rev. John W., D. D., Roxbury, 829 

Otheman, Rev. Edward, Chelsea, 865 

Palmer, Julius A., Boston, 788 

Peabody, Ex-Mayor Andrew J., Lowell, 541 

Perham, David, Chelmsford, ' 853 

Pitman, Hon. Robert C, New Bedford, 447 

Plumb, Rev. A. H., Chelsea, 664, 674 

Pollard, Rev. Andrew, D. D., Taunton, 645 

Raymond, Ex-Mayor Z. L., Cambridge, . . . 594 

Richards, Calvin A., Boston, 633 

Sabin, Henry L., M. D., Williamstown, 761 

Seelye, Rev. Samuel T., D. D., Easthampton, 737 

Spaulding, Rev. Willard, Salem, 827 

Storer, Horatio R., M. D., Boston, .797 

Stoddard, Charles, Boston, . . • 418 

Taft, Hon. Valorous, Upton, 814 

Thurston, Rev. Eli, D. D., Fall River, • . 587 

Trask, Hon. Eliphalet, Springfield, 462 

Trask, Rev. George, Fitchburg, 620 

Tyler, Rev. William S., Amherst, 707 

Uphara, James H., Dorchester, 678 

Usher, Mayor Roland G., Lynn, ... 666 

Walker, Hon. Amasa, North Brookfield, 483 

Walton, Hon. George A., Lawrence, 684 

Warren, Rev. William F., D. D., Wilbraham, 807 

White, Hon. Joseph, Boston, 568 

Willet, Rev. J. W., Taunton, 652 

Williams, Hon. Hartley, Worcester, 863 

Wilson, Rev. George P., Lawrence, 688 

Wood, Rev. Horatio, Lowell, 538 



IN BEHALF OF THE COLLEGE OF PHARMACY. 

Bixby, Charles C, North Bridgewater, 880 

Buckinghom, Charles E., M. D., Boston, 869 

Campbell, Isaac T., Boston, 888 

Hollis, Thomas, Boston, 889 

Hunt, James L., Hingham, . 875,883 

Lincoln, Henry W., Boston, 871 

Rand, William T., Boston, 879 

Reed, Sampson, Boston, 885 

Simmons, Frank W., Boston, 886 



4-JE 1059 



© 



